2024 Presidential Election
Venezuela & Nicolas Maduro
In the 1910s it was found that Venezuela was rich in crude oil, since they lacked the industrialization & technology to extract & refine it, they reached out to other Countries with expertise. In the 1920s Companies such as Chevron, ExxonMobil & ConocoPhillips purchased and owned large Oil Fields and built Refineries with Contracts extremely lucrative to Venezuela, up to 50% take on revenue, quickly elevating Venezuela to one of the wealthiest countries in the world. Hugo Chávez came into power like Zohran Mamdani promising Socialism. He militarily stormed and commandeered all these US assets in 2007. International Arbitration Panels ordered Chávez to pay hundreds of billions in restitution, which he ignored.
Chávez's regime lacked the skill & knowledge to operate & maintaining what they usurped, quickly relegating Venezuela from one of the wealthiest countries in the world to one of the poorest. Chávez killed the Goose that layed to Golden Egg, then resorted to drug revenue attempting to fill the gap. Nicolas Maduro was a drug lord hand picked to replace Chávez when he died in 2013. Democrats can say what they will, but the Biden administration established a $25 Million dollar bounty on the capture of Nicolas Madoro, looks like they owe Trump some cash:
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/10/world/americas/biden-bounty-nicolas-maduro.html