© Reuters/Ueslei MarcelinoNicolas Maduro and son 'Nicolasito' at the Constituent National Assembly in Caracas, 2017
"Maduro relies on his son Nicolasito and others close to his authoritarian regime to maintain a stranglehold on the economy and suppress the people of Venezuela," Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin stated on Friday. "Treasury will continue to target complicit relatives of illegitimate regime insiders profiting off of Maduro's corruption."
The 29-year-old Maduro Jr. serves as a member of Venezuela's Constituent National Assembly (CNA), a legislature staffed entirely by Maduro loyalists. The US already sanctioned eight Venezuelan officials responsible for establishing the Constituent National Assembly in 2017, and Washington considers the opposition-led National Assembly -a parallel legislature- the only acceptable institution in Venezuela.
The latest crack of the economic whip comes after the Trump administration's initial fervor for deposing Maduro seems to have all but fizzled out. After throwing its support behind opposition leader Juan Guaido earlier this year and repeatedly declaring "all options are on the table" when it comes to ousting Maduro, Washington has since reverted to ratcheting up sanctions in a bid to squeeze the Latin American country further.
Neither Guaido's attempts to rally Venezuelan dissidents for a coup nor Washington's economic penalties have succeeded in dislodging Maduro, whose hands remain firmly on the levers of power in Caracas.
How revolting! THis sounds like a string of hysterical insults more than anything else. The number of lies to unpack (ugh) in this short sentence is gross:
There's no regime; there's an elected president, Nicolas Maduro, and therefore the goverment is not illegitimate. The son can't be complicit of a regime which does not exist because the government is legitimate, and so he as a member of the government is legally entitled to be there. There's no proof that Maduro is corrupt; on the contrary there are plenty of indications that he is not, so 'insiders', meaning legitimate participants in an elected government, would have difficulty profiting off non-existant corruption.
On the side, I'm told by a texan friend (mnuchin is texan) that the man is known to an absolute ass and thorough bootlicker..................