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Obama administration urges Venezuela sanctions

Xidmara Landaeta waves flags as Venezuelans from Doral, Fla., prepare for their bus trip to Washington on Thursday to ask Congress and the president to impose sanctions on Venezuelan government officials because of presumed human rights violations. (Associated Press)
Chris Adams McClatchy-Tribune

WASHINGTON – The Obama administration said in a Senate hearing Thursday it was hesitant to use individual sanctions as a tactic in the Venezuelan political crisis, saying that doing so could escalate the situation into a fight between the Maduro regime and the United States rather than a struggle between that country’s people and their government.

In response, Democrats and Republicans on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee sharply criticized the administration, indicating it was being far too timid in pushing back against the government of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and its repressive tactics against political protesters.

Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., was among the sharpest critics, blasting officials from the State Department for failing to advocate for sanctions against individuals in Venezuela although sanctions have been used – and continue to be used – elsewhere.

Citing sanctions against individuals in Russia for that country’s actions in Ukraine, Rubio asked what the difference was between repressive officials there and in Venezuela.

“We sanction human rights violators all the time,” Rubio said. “The only difference between those sanctions, those people, and others, is they spend their weekends in Miami.”

He spoke of people connected to the Venezuelan regime who live in Miami and “drive up and down the streets in their fancy cars. They laugh at you and they laugh at us, because they know they can get away with these things.” Using sanctions against the Venezuelan officials will not cause them to be unified against the United States, because they already are, Rubio said.

“Let me give you a brief bulletin: They are already united against us,” Rubio said.

Rubio, Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., and others are backing legislation that would authorize sanctions to help mitigate the situation in Venezuela.

The administration, represented by Roberta Jacobson, assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs, stressed that the administration’s policy was to attempt to make sure the Venezuelan conflict didn’t escalate into a Maduro-vs.-U.S. dispute. Sanctions, while they can be effective some times, need to be used carefully, she said.

Asked Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn.: “If we were going to nudge you along, how would you like to be nudged?”

“We think we don’t necessarily need the nudge,” Jacobson said. “We’re considering these things. We do think that right now they would be counterproductive.” She said sanctions would serve to reinforce a narrative of the Venezuelan government standing up to the United States – rather than the Venezuelan people standing up for themselves.

Since February, Venezuelans protesting the Maduro regime have met with brutal state-sanctioned violence. According to Rubio, “The government’s barbaric repression has resulted in at least 41 deaths that we know of, more than 2,519 detentions and at least 80 documented cases of torture.”