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Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro sworn in for third term despite evidence he lost

Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, surrounded by others, claps.
Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, center, wife Cilia Flores and National Assembly President Jorge Rodriguez arrive at the National Assembly in Caracas on Friday for Maduro’s swearing-in ceremony for a third term.
(Matias Delacroix / Associated Press)

Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro was sworn in Friday to serve a third six-year term, extending his increasingly repressive rule until 2031 despite protests and credible evidence that his opponent won the election.

Venezuela’s legislative palace, where Maduro was sworn in and delivered a fiery speech, was heavily guarded by police, military and intelligence officers. Crowds of people, many sporting pro-Maduro T-shirts, gathered in adjacent streets and a nearby plaza.

Maduro accused the opposition of trying to turn his inauguration into a “world war,” and said the faction’s failure to stop the inauguration was “a great Venezuelan victory.” He accused external powers, specifically the U.S. government, of “attacking” Venezuela and promised to guarantee “peace and national sovereignty.”

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“Today more than ever I feel the weight of commitment, the power that I represent, the power that the constitution grants me,” he said. “I have not been made president by the government of the United States, nor by the pro-imperialist governments of Latin America.”

The opposition collected tally sheets from more than 80% of electronic voting machines following the July 28 election, posted the tallies online and said they showed that opposition candidate Edmundo González Urrutia won twice as many votes as Maduro. The U.S.-based Carter Center, which observed the election on the government’s invitation, declared the opposition-published tallies legitimate. Other election experts that the government allowed to witness the vote said polling records posted online by the opposition appear to exhibit all of the original security features.

Edmundo González’s departure is a blow to the opposition and foreign governments who consider him the legitimate winner of the presidential election.

On Friday, the European Union imposed sanctions on 15 top Venezuelan officials who had a role in the country’s 2024 election, including the president and vice president of Venezuela’s Supreme Court, the electoral agency and others. The 27-nation bloc said those officials have put the nation’s democracy at risk.

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The U.S. Treasury Department also imposed a new round of sanctions on Venezuelan officials, including the president of Venezuela’s state oil company, its state-owned airline and Maduro’s transportation minister, among others.

On Thursday, as hundreds of anti-Maduro protesters took to the streets of the capital, Caracas, aides to opposition leader María Corina Machado said she was briefly detained by security forces and coerced into recording videos.

In tricky strategy, U.S. says Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro lost election but isn’t recognizing his opponent as the new president.

The popular former lawmaker, whom the government has barred from running for office, had emerged from months of hiding to join the rally to demand González be sworn in instead of Maduro.

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Machado addressed the rally then left on a motorcycle with her security convoy. Machado’s press team later announced on social media that security forces “violently intercepted” her convoy. Her aides confirmed to the Associated Press that the opposition leader was detained.

Leaders in the Americas and Europe condemned the government for suppressing opposition voices and demanded her release. President-elect Donald Trump expressed his support for Machado and González.

“These freedom fighters should not be harmed, and MUST stay SAFE and ALIVE!” Trump said on Truth Social.

Maduro’s supporters denied that Machado was arrested.

The brouhaha ahead of Maduro’s inauguration added to the litany of allegations of electoral fraud and brutal repression imposed to silence dissent.

Electoral authorities loyal to the ruling party declared Maduro the winner hours after polls closed on July 28, but unlike in previous presidential elections, they did not provide detailed vote counts.

Global condemnation over the lack of transparency prompted Maduro to ask the country’s high court — also filled with allies of his United Socialist Party of Venezuela — to audit the election results. The court reaffirmed Maduro’s victory while providing only scant evidence and encouraged the electoral council to release the vote counts. But neither the council nor the ruling party produced any evidence that Maduro had won, even though their voting center representatives also were entitled to tally sheets from every voting machine.

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The dispute over the results prompted international outrage and nationwide protests. The government responded with full force, arresting more than 2,000 demonstrators and encouraging Venezuelans to report anyone they suspect to be a ruling-party adversary. More than 20 people were killed during the unrest and many protesters reported being tortured in custody.

It is unclear how many heads of state attended Maduro’s swearing-in, hosted by the ruling-party-controlled National Assembly. Cameras showed Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega and Cuba’s Miguel Diaz-Canel. Maduro greeted delegates from what he said numbered more than 120 nations.

Colombian President Gustavo Petro, a close Maduro ally, said he would skip the event, citing the detentions earlier in the week of another longtime Venezuelan opposition member and a human rights defender.

Maduro’s last inauguration, in 2019, was attended by Diaz-Canel and then-Bolivian President Evo Morales. The 2018 election was widely considered a sham after his government banned major opposition parties from participating.

And it remains unclear whether González, who left for exile in Spain in September, will fulfill his promise to return to Venezuela by Friday.

Government officials have repeatedly threatened González with arrest should he step on Venezuelan soil. On Tuesday, González said his son-in-law Rafael Tudares had been kidnapped in Caracas. González’s daughter, Mariana González de Tudares, suggested in a statement that the government was behind her husband’s disappearance.

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“At what point did being related to Edmundo González Urrutia become a crime?” she said.

Cano writes for the Associated Press. AP writer Jorge Rueda contributed to this report.

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