Venezuela Is on the Verge of a Major Humanitarian Tragedy

These central truths are being unfortunately concealed by pointless distractions, most recently Trump’s dishonest account of America’s history with Venezuela’s oil industry. (Rodríguez, and others, have handily rebutted Trump’s assertions that Venezuela “stole” America’s oil. What’s more, Chevron, an American company, was still legally exporting Venezuelan oil—at least until Trump imposed the blockade.)

Instead, here’s what’s truly important: During Trump’s first term, Rodríguez explains, the U.S. declared economic war against Venezuela. The pressure did not cause the Maduro government to fall, but it did shove Venezuela into what is by far the greatest economic crisis in Latin America’s history, and arguably the most profound crisis anywhere in the world that was not the result of an actual war.

That crisis raised hunger rates, boosted infant mortality to the second-highest figure in Latin America, and left some 82 percent of the population below the poverty line. Understandably, 8 million people fled, one-quarter of the entire population, which also set a new exodus record in Latin America. Emblematic of the old saying, “You break it, you’ve bought it,” nearly 800,000 Venezuelans ended up in the United States.