Suspicions Abound as Maduro Named Winner in Venezuela Presidential Election

Any questions of the legitimacy of his electoral victory would make it difficult for Maduro to be recognized internationally.

Venezuela’s electoral authority, controlled by the ruling regime, said Nicolás Maduro was reelected as the nation’s president for six more years, drawing criticism from the U.S. and some Latin American countries and setting off what is likely to be a clash with opposition parties.

Maduro won Sunday’s election with 51.2% of the vote, compared with 44.2% for rival Edmundo González, the electoral center said. An exit poll conducted by U.S. firm Edison Research instead had González winning by more than 30 percentage points, lending to suspicions that Maduro’s administration had tampered with the tally.

The U.S. has “serious concerns that the result announced does not reflect the will or the votes of the Venezuelan people,” U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said during a visit to Tokyo. Chilean President Gabriel Boric called the results “difficult to believe,” saying his country wouldn’t recognize unverifiable totals.

González has yet to comment on the official results. But he was expected to have his own tally with help from a network of roughly 30,000 volunteer witnesses at polling centers across the country. Late Sunday, minutes before the official tally was announced, opposition leaders said they’d only received access to 30% of the nation’s voting tabulations, which were supposed to be provided so they could verify the vote.

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Several hours passed between the close of voting and the official announcement, drawing significant international attention late Sunday. The U.S., Argentina and Colombia were among at least 11 American nations calling on Maduro throughout the evening to ensure results respect the popular will. In a post on X, Peru’s foreign minister denounced what he called “fraudulent intent” by Venezuela’s government.

“The Maduro regime has opted to announce a result at odds with all exit polls and early indications of an opposition victory, indicating their intent to stay in power,” said Ryan Berg, director of the Americas Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

Turnout was 59% of eligible voters, the election agency said. That would be higher than the 2018 vote, which the opposition boycotted, but significantly below the more than 70% turnout in elections in 2006, 2012 and 2013. González had said earlier Sunday that turnout had been “massive.”

Maduro blamed the delay on a hack on the electoral authority’s transmission system and said the public prosecutor would investigate the cause and “make justice,” in remarks following the results. Public Prosecutor Tarek William Saab said he will offer a press conference on Monday morning.

As the results were announced, a crowd gathered in front of Miraflores, the presidential palace, burst into wild applause. Fireworks could be heard throughout the city, along with people banging on pots and pans—a popular form of protest in Latin America.

Maduro will face the challenge of legitimizing the vote to his people and the rest of the world, given his government’s history of repression and fraudulent elections. González was running in the place of María Corina Machado, who experienced a meteoric rise in popularity even after the government banned her from seeking public office.

If the opposition disputes the official count as expected, the situation is likely to remain tense for days. Venezuela’s military leadership, which has long backed Maduro but can act independently, could choose to intervene in some way. International pressure from allies including Brazil and Colombia might also play a role.

A small mission of observers from the Carter Center is expected to release preliminary findings on Tuesday. A similar mission from the United Nations is observing the vote, but as is tradition, will not present their findings to the public. Venezuela withdrew the invitation to observe the vote from a more robust European Union group.

González and Machado had sought to dismantle government controls on the economy, privatize the oil industry and reunite families torn apart by the exodus of 7.7 million Venezuelans.

Maduro’s third consecutive term, if it starts as planned in January 2025, would be a challenging one.

After the economic crisis that stretched from 2013 to 2020, the president has led a remarkable transition away from his late predecessor Hugo Chávez’s policies, easing restrictions on businesses, price controls and regulations, and most significantly, allowing the U.S. dollar to circulate legally. He has withstood crippling U.S. sanctions meant to weaken his government, and prevailed over Juan Guaidó, who sought to unseat him after being recognized in 2019 as the legitimate president of Venezuela by the U.S. and dozens of allied nations.

Now, he will have to navigate a path to growth for the still-ailing $102 billion economy, find a way toward sanctions relief and negotiate a $158 billion debt restructuring.

Any questions of the legitimacy of his electoral victory, however, would make it difficult for Maduro to be recognized internationally as the country’s president and secure much-needed sanctions relief.