Trump’s Domestic Pressures for a Potential War in Venezuela

Javier Corrales

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The Trump Administration is escalating war threats in Venezuela. Officials claim that the goal is to curb the drug trade. Critics contend that the real aim is regime change. These may be secondary aims. A more noble aim might be to promote democracy in Venezuela. However, the most likely impact of President Donald Trump’s approach to a potential war in Venezuela will be consolidated power, and Republican coalition management, at home.

A key part of Trump’s electoral coalition is fraying. Mass deportations are causing buyers’ remorse among Florida Cubans and Venezuelans who voted for Trump. While popular across his MAGA movement, mass deportations have shocked many Latino Trump voters; they likely never thought deportations would be so massive.

The drumbeat of war in Venezuela could appeal to Latinos who voted for Trump, at least in part, because they thought President Joe Biden was too soft toward Latin America’s leftist regimes.

Ironically, Trump’s initial approach toward Venezuela’s leftist dictatorship in the first half of 2025 was even softer than Biden’s. Guided by a pro-oil coalition, Trump’s initial approach to Venezuela was to pact with the dictator: Return a few prisoners, accept deportees, let U.S. oil firms gain more access to Venezuelan oil, and the U.S government would tolerate the regime.

Maduro signed on to this deal. But many Cubans and Venezuelans living in Florida hated it.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio emerged as the strongest advocate on behalf of this disaffected Florida constituency. He persuaded Trump—ever the change-his-mind president—to change his mind about Venezuela. By the end of summer, Trump abandoned his truce approach in favor of war talk.

To be sure, Maduro is one of the world's leading autocratizers—and one of the meanest. He inherited from Hugo Chávez a mixed regime that had plenty of autocratic elements but also democratic traces. In less than one electoral cycle, Maduro eliminated all democratic traces and turned the system into one of the most repressive, poverty-producing, and corrupt machines in the world.