President Trump’s special envoy, Richard Grenell, traveled to Venezuela on Friday to demand that leader Nicolás Maduro accept the “unconditional” return of deported Venezuelans, according to a U.S. official.
“President Trump expects Nicolás Maduro to take back all of the Venezuelan criminals and gang members that have been exported to the United States, and to do so unequivocally and without condition,” the U.S. special envoy for Latin America told reporters.
The Trump administration recently suspended deportation protections for hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans. Grenell’s meeting with Maduro comes just ahead of Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s first foreign trip, which aims to reaffirm U.S. engagement in Latin America.
Rubio’s week-long trip, beginning Saturday in Panama and including stops in El Salvador, Costa Rica, Guatemala, and the Dominican Republic, will focus on advancing President Trump’s “America First” foreign policy. According to reports, he is expected to discuss with El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele the possibility of transferring members of Venezuela’s gang Tren de Aragua, currently detained in the U.S., to Salvadoran prisons.
During the trip, Rubio “will promote regional cooperation on our core, shared interests: stopping illegal and large-scale migration, fighting the scourge of transnational criminal organizations and drug traffickers, countering China, and deepening economic partnerships to enhance prosperity in our hemisphere,” the State Department said in a statement.
This post has been updated with new information.
