Maduro asked for $200m in deal with Trump to flee
Venezuela’s president asked to keep $200m of his private wealth, amnesty for his officials and safe harbour in a friendly country as part of a deal with Donald Trump to step down and flee, sources said.
Those familiar with a phone call between the two leaders told The Telegraph that the plan fell apart owing to Nicolas Maduro’s demands for a blanket amnesty for as many as 100 top officials.
During the 15-minute call, the two leaders also disagreed on how to set up a transitional government and on the location Mr Maduro would flee to from Venezuela.
Mr Trump suggested China or Russia, according to one source, while the Venezuelan president was intent on staying in the Western hemisphere, in a friendly country such as Cuba.
In the interim, Qatar has emerged as a possible compromise.
Mr Maduro confirmed on Wednesday that he had spoken with the US president “about 10 days ago”.
Regime on borrowed time
Since the call on Nov 21, Mr Trump has stepped up pressure on the hardline Venezuelan government.
With the US building up an armada of warships in the Caribbean, on Tuesday Mr Trump said he was close to launching strikes on Venezuelan soil.
“We know where the bad ones live, and we’re going to start that very soon,” he said.
The US views Edmundo González as the rightful president of Venezuela following fraudulent elections in 2024.
Edmundo Gonzalez, the Venezuelan opposition presidential candidate - Ariana Cubillos/AP
In August, Washington doubled the bounty on Mr Maduro’s head, offering $50m for information leading to his arrest for alleged drug trafficking.
The build-up of American troops and military hardware in the region in recent weeks has sent a clear signal to the president and his key lieutenants that they are living on borrowed time.
The New York Times reported on Tuesday that Mr Maduro had become increasingly reliant on Cuban bodyguards and slept at a different location each night.
Amid the escalating tensions, the Trump administration has steered away from talking about regime change.
However, in their phone call, the American president offered Mr Maduro a soft option version of a soft way out.
The leader would be given amnesty with his wife and son and a chance to flee the country if he promised to resign on the spot.
‘A rock and a hard place’
It is understood that some of the discussion centred on Mr Maduro’s desire to live a comfortable life in exile.
He asked to leave with $200m (£150m), two sources confirmed, possibly from funds already frozen by US authorities.
That was not the sticking point.
More problematic was his demand that amnesty be given to dozens of his associates and that key allies would run a transitional government that would eventually oversee free elections.
One of the sources familiar with the call said Mr Maduro “was caught between a rock and a hard place”.
He could face reprisals from senior figures if he agreed to a deal that left close allies to face justice.
“It’s self-preservation, not altruism,” said the source.
But that demand was unacceptable to US officials. They have made it their mission to bring down the Cartel de los Soles, a network of military and political officials who run much of the country’s drug trade.
A broad amnesty could leave much of that cartel, designated by Washington as a “foreign terrorist organisation”, in place.
A victory for Trump?
Vanessa Neumann, who served as envoy for the Venezuelan opposition to London, said it was no surprise that both sides were trying to find an off-ramp for Mr Maduro.
“The thing that Trump has to weigh would be whether Maduro exiting would be viewed as a win for him,” she said.
“Everybody plays to their own local constituency. So if you have a big part of Cartel de Los Soles remain intact, how much of a victory is that for Trump?”
The White House faces a ticking clock as it weighs its next move.
Elements of Mr Trump’s Maga base are becoming restless at the thought of a new foreign adventure.
Maintaining the huge military presence in the region is costing hundreds of millions of dollars. The price of keeping the USS Gerald R Ford carrier strike group on station in the Caribbean is estimated at more than $6m every day.
Ms Neumann said American officials had already identified targets for strikes during years of surveillance.
“I do think that if there is no acceptable deal coming, and Maduro is constantly negotiating and leading people along, then I think that there would be at the very least some command and control strikes,” she said.
Since the call, Mr Maduro’s position in the region has weakened. Elections in Honduras and in St Vincent and the Grenadines have seen Leftist allies defeated.