[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 14]
[Senate]
[Pages 19690-19692]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                         ELECTIONS IN VENEZUELA

  Mr. MENENDEZ. Mr. President, I want to express my outrage and horror 
at the out-of-control electoral situation in Venezuela--at the 
intimidation, violence, manipulation, and corruption by the Maduro 
government to manipulate election results in their favor.
  For weeks, President Maduro has said that his party will do whatever 
it takes to stay in power, and I have no doubt that he will do 
everything he can to stay in power. In recent days, Maduro said: ``If 
on December 6th the political-right wins, prepare to see a country in 
chaos, in violence. I will not turn over nor will I betray the 
revolution''--a clear statement of what's to come, but the world is 
watching.
  In October, he gave a public speech in which he said that if the 
opposition wins, the country would enter into one of its ``most 
turbulent periods'' because he will not turn over the revolution, and 
if necessary, he would rule through what he called ``a civic military 
union.'' Maduro's cronies have also made alarming, ominous statements 
in recent weeks warning the public that the ruling party will not lose 
control. The government has already denied international election 
observers, so, clearly, we know what is about to happen.
  Maduro's term is not yet up, but it is only a matter of time, and 
this election will be a demonstration of his complete failure. The fact 
is numbers don't lie, and the crushing poll numbers coming out are 
further proof the country is ready for fundamental change from a failed 
economic model that has run its course and needs to be done away with. 
All of this against a backdrop of continued deceit, repression, and 
violence.
  Last week, in broad daylight, armed supporters of the government 
assassinated Luiz Manuel Diaz, the state-level head of the Accion 
Democratica, or Democratic Action Party, at an open-air rally in the 
state of Guarico--clearly a politically targeted assassination designed 
to terrorize opposition parties and their supporters. Luiz Manuel Diaz 
was standing 6 feet away from Lilian Tintori, whom I have met several 
times, the wife of the high-profile political prisoner, Leopoldo Lopez.
  This level of unacceptable, blatant violence is appalling and has 
been condemned by OAS Secretary General Luis Almagro, the U.N. High 
Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein, and by countless 
human rights organizations. Again, the world is clearly watching and 
demanding that the rule of law in Venezuela be reestablished.
  The fact is the government is engaged in clear election manipulation. 
The government-controlled National Electoral Council has disqualified 
seven leading opposition figures from participating in the elections--
disqualifications without justification and without a process to 
appeal. The disqualifications have targeted only members of the 
opposition: Maria Corina Machado, the diputada--assembly member--that 
received the single

[[Page 19691]]

highest number of votes in the 2010 elections; Manuel Rosales, the 
former governor of Zulia state and a former Presidential candidate for 
the opposition; Leopoldo Lopez, currently being held in a military 
prison, the most high-profile political prisoner in the Americas.
  The government has also fabricated a border crisis with neighboring 
Colombia as a pretext to declare a state of emergency, in 23 
municipalities in 3 states along the Colombian-Venezuelan border. This 
allows the government to arbitrarily suspend the fundamental rights of 
citizens in these municipalities to a right to assembly, right to 
peaceful demonstrations--and, guess what, it just so happens that these 
municipalities are either swing districts or ones where the opposition 
won handily in the 2010 legislative elections. In these same three 
states, the opposition won 18 of the 27 seats contested. The government 
is even resorting to political tricks.
  In one district, in the city of Maracay, the leading opposition 
candidate is named Ismael Garcia, a lifelong political veteran. The 
government managed to find a 28-year-old parking attendant named Ismael 
Garcia, who is running under a party name similar to the opposition 
candidate, with a logo nearly identical.
  In another area in the capital of Caracas, the National Statistics 
Institute and National Electoral Council have determined that, by the 
end of the year, 128,000 voters are scheduled to move out of a district 
largely supportive of the opposition to a district supportive of the 
government. This move is large enough to decrease by one the number of 
deputies that the opposition district will elect and enough to increase 
by one the number of deputies that the pro-government district will 
elect.
  The National Statistics Institute and National Electoral Council 
acknowledge that 134,000 votes will move back to the pro-opposition 
district by the middle of next year, which means 130,000 people are 
moving for a period of 6 to 9 months.
  The Maduro government can't believe they can hide from these obvious 
tactics of political tricks to rob the people of Venezuela of their 
right to a free and fair election. They can't be so naive to think that 
these ridiculous tactics are going unnoticed. We are not blind to it. 
We are watching. And I come to the floor of the Senate to send a clear 
message that makes it clear that the world is watching and waiting for 
the results of the election and the aftermath.
  Against this backdrop of violence, intimidation, corruption, and 
election fraud, the Venezuelan Government has routinely denied the 
presence of credible international election observers. If the 
Venezuelan Government was interested in guaranteeing the transparency, 
objectivity, and credibility of the elections, it would have invited 
the OAS--the region's preeminent multilateral body--to observe the 
elections.
  Since 1989, the OAS has conducted more than 160 election observation 
missions in 24 countries. The OAS Secretary General has repeatedly 
offered to observe, but Maduro has turned him down. The EU has also 
offered to observe--also rejected by the government. Instead, the 
Venezuelan Government has opted for a mission from Union de Naciones 
Suramericanas, UNASUR, which conducts ``electoral accompaniment'' 
rather than ``election observation.'' The technical rigor of the UNASUR 
mission has been called into question by many members of the 
international community. Brazil's Supreme Electoral Court banned 
Brazil's participation in the UNASUR mission. Chile and Uruguay also 
will not participate in the UNASUR mission. As a Washington Post 
headline put it this week, ``Venezuela [is heading] to a pivotal 
election; without a referee.''
  As Venezuela heads into this election, nationwide polls are showing a 
strong and sustained trend in favor of the opposition. National polling 
shows opposition candidates leading by 28 points. This growing 
advantage is the result of an increasingly dire outlook that reflects 
the state of the nation. The people of Venezuela have and are suffering 
economic hardship. They are subjected to increased societal violence. 
They have seen more and more evidence that senior government officials 
are personally and deeply involved in drug trafficking, deeply involved 
in money laundering. In fact, his own family members have been arrested 
for drug trafficking.
  And, to make matters worse, as President Maduro, a former bus driver, 
has driven his country's economy off a cliff, there have been shortages 
of beef and milk, chicken and eggs, rice and pasta; there have been 
shortages of soap for bathing and diapers for small children. And this 
trend will likely get worse. This year, the IMF predicts that 
Venezuela's GDP will contract by 10 percent--the single largest 
economic contraction in the world this year. The country is also 
suffering from the highest levels of inflation in the entire world, 
more than 150 percent in 2015 according to the IMF, and expected to 
surpass 200 percent in 2016.
  As economic hardship grows, it shouldn't be a complete surprise that 
criminality in the country has worsened--the murder rate more than 
doubling over the past decade. According to the Venezuela Violence 
Observatory, the per capita murder rate in Venezuela was 37 per 100,000 
in 2005, 54 per 100,000 in 2010, and 82 per 100,000 in 2014. And things 
are even worse in the capital Caracas, where the per capita murder rate 
is approaching 125 per 100,000 residents. This puts Caracas among the 
top five most violent cities in the world and on par with the carnage 
generally seen only in war zones.
  On top of this widespread societal violence, in 2014, the world bore 
witness to Venezuelan security forces violently deployed on the streets 
to suppress peaceful protests occurring throughout the country that has 
left 43 people dead on both sides of the political divide, more than 50 
documented cases of torture of opposition activists, and thousands of 
arrests. Throughout this violence, respected international human rights 
organization Human Rights Watch found that human rights abuses were a 
``systematic practice'' committed by Venezuelan security forces.
  To make matters worse, a darker and more sinister narrative has 
emerged from Venezuela in 2015. In March of this year, the Treasury 
Department's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network--known as FinCEN--
announced the Private Bank of Andorra is a ``foreign financial 
institution of primary money laundering concern.'' Among other 
concerns, FinCEN found that the bank had been involved in a scheme that 
siphoned off roughly $2 billion from Venezuelan state oil company 
PDVSA, a scheme that surely included widespread involvement and 
knowledge of Venezuelan Government officials. The world is watching.
  In May of this year, in a Wall Street Journal exclusive, the world 
was informed that the Department of Justice, the Drug Enforcement 
Agency, and several Federal prosecutors' offices are investigating 
Diosdado Cabello for involvement in drug trafficking, a man who serves 
as the head of Venezuela's National Assembly and someone generally 
regarded as the second most powerful figure in the government's 
coalition. And now he is apparently wanted for turning Venezuela into a 
global cocaine hub.
  And in October, in another incredibly well-documented piece, the Wall 
Street Journal revealed how money laundering and embezzlement inside 
Venezuelan state oil giant Venezuela was directed from the highest 
levels, including by former PDVSA president Rafael Ramirez. These two 
incidents are part of a long and troubling series of disturbing 
revelations about how the highest levels of the power are directly 
responsible for the Venezuelan state becoming penetrated by drug 
trafficking and criminality.
  With such sinister trends becoming commonplace in Venezuela, it is 
important to recognize that a sea change of opinion is taking place in 
Latin America, and increasingly, key political leaders are speaking out 
forcefully against what they are seeing in Venezuela.
  In September of this year, 34 former Presidents and heads of state 
from

[[Page 19692]]

across Latin America and the Caribbean met in Bogota and issued a 
declaration calling for international election observation, greater 
safeguards for Venezuelan voters, and the release of political 
prisoners in the country.
  Last month, the secretary general of the OAS Luis Almagro released a 
scathing letter to the head of Venezuela's National Electoral Council, 
laying out all of his concerns with the process running up to the 
December 6 elections and calling for an immediate course correction.
  Also, last month, I was proud to join with 17 of my colleagues here 
in the U.S. Senate, 32 Brazilian senators, 57 Colombian senators, 12 
Chilean senators, 26 Costa Rica Assembly members, and 13 Peruvian 
members of Congress--more than 150 legislators from across the 
Americas--in an unprecedented showing of unity to call for election 
observation, speak out against the disqualification of opposition 
candidates, and call for the release of political prisoners. And just 
last week, it was important to see Argentina's President-elect Mauricio 
Macri calling for the South American trade block Mercosur to review 
whether Venezuela should be suspended from the block for violating its 
democracy clause and failing to uphold human rights.
  The question then remains, what can we do? What can the United States 
do? As elections are held in Venezuela this weekend, it is imperative 
that we all remain clear-eyed about the challenges at hand in the 
country. For 15 years, we have watched as President Maduro and former-
President Chavez have systematically dismantled democracy in the 
country. They have removed checks on the executive. They have corrupted 
the judiciary and the rule of law. They have usurped the powers of the 
legislature. They have politicized the military. And they have 
suppressed freedom of the press.
  No one should be surprised that 15 years of democratic deterioration 
has led to economic ruin, to rampant criminality, and to an 
increasingly dangerous political polarization. But the first step to 
correct course and help Venezuelans back from the brink of being a 
failed state is the exercise this weekend of that most fundamental 
democratic right with a huge voter turnout that could help move the 
country back toward democracy and the rule of law.
  We should take note that Latin America is speaking out forcefully 
about the situation in Venezuela, but we in the United States should be 
preparing our own response. Last week, the Washington Post Editorial 
Board noted that should the vote be disrupted in Venezuela, the ``U.S. 
should be ready to respond with censure and sanctions.'' I couldn't 
agree more.
  In December of 2014, the U.S. Congress, with the unanimous consent of 
both Chambers, approved the Venezuela Defense of Human Rights and Civil 
Society Act--legislation which I authored and introduced with Senators 
Nelson, Rubio, Kirk, and McCain. This bipartisan bill called for 
mandatory sanctions against violations of human rights and fundamental 
freedoms and provided the administration with the authorities it needs. 
The administration has used these sanctions once, but we should be 
prepared, if necessary, to use them again.
  We know what is happening in Venezuela: subversion of democracy 
through state-sponsored violence; repression; hundreds of thousands of 
Venezuelans in the streets earlier this year protesting alarming levels 
of violence and crime; sky-high inflation rates; the scarcity of food 
and basic consumer goods. That is today's Venezuela. The question is: 
Can we make tomorrow better for the people of Venezuela?
  The world watched as President Maduro and his government responded to 
protests with a brutal display of force not seen in our hemisphere in 
over a decade. The results: more than 40 deaths, more than 50 
documented cases of torture, and thousands of unlawful detentions. In 
May, Human Rights Watch released a devastating report that said 
Venezuelan human rights violations ``were part of a systematic practice 
by Venezuelan security forces'' and that these abuses were intended to 
``punish people for their political views.''
  As I have said repeatedly and as is the case today, not one 
Venezuelan Government official or member of the security forces has 
been held accountable for their role in beating, shooting, jailing, or 
torturing peaceful protesters--not one. Now they threaten to highjack 
the electoral process, and they must know that the world is watching 
and that there will be consequences to their actions.

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