Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado has announced her return to Venezuela almost a year after leaving the country to receive the Nobel Peace Prize.
“I’m here. With you,” she wrote on X on Sunday noon.
His close ally Edmundo González, in exile, confirmed his arrival. “Venezuela! I am delighted to announce that our leader, my dear María Corina, is on Venezuelan soil,” he posted on social media.
“Today is a very important day for Venezuelans. Our sovereign voice returns with it to lead and guide this process!” he said, adding that he too would return soon.
It is unclear how Machado, 59, managed to return to Venezuela, but images posted on social media showed she was in Barquisimeto, the capital of Lara state, located about 220 miles west of the capital, Caracas.
Footage showed her surrounded by supporters holding cell phones at a church called the Sanctuary of the Divine Shepherdess.
The Trump administration reportedly opposed Machado’s return, saying his presence would complicate the warm relationship it has established with interim President Delcy Rodríguez since the kidnapping of her former boss, Nicolás Maduro, in January.
Machado and Rodríguez are major political rivals.
Machado escaped from Venezuela last December – weeks before Maduro’s capture – and is believed to have made more than half a dozen failed attempts to return home in recent months, including after the devastating earthquake that hit the northern coast in June.
After Maduro took over, many expected Donald Trump to give Machado his blessing to take power. His movement is widely believed to have defeated Maduro in the 2024 presidential election, but he has refused to cede power.
Instead, the US president embraced Rodríguez, Maduro’s vice president, who now governs a country widely seen as a US protectorate.
Machado repeatedly praised Trump for launching the operation to remove Maduro and awarded him the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize, which she received for her peaceful challenge to Venezuela’s authoritarian government.
Asked by reporters Sunday about her return, Trump said: “I don’t know, but I think she’s a very nice woman. She gave me her Nobel Prize, so how can I say anything else?”
“I hope she is safe. She is a very nice woman. But we are doing very well in Venezuela,” he said.
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