>>2785643Ms. Rodríguez’s caretaker post began hours after Mr. Maduro’s capture, on Jan. 3, with a fiery speech denouncing U.S. aggression. A week later, Ms. Rodríguez led a retinue of power brokers and Cuban officials to commemorate dozens of Cuban and Venezuelan servicemen who died in the American attack.
“We are not handing down a legacy of traitors and cowards,” Ms. Rodríguez said in a televised speech intended to project unity.
Most of those by her side that day have since been cast aside.
Mr. Maduro’s longest-serving minister, Gen. Vladimir Padrino López, was fired as defense minister in March and later given a much less important post running agriculture. Mr. Maduro’s son, Nicolás Maduro Guerra, and a son of Ms. Flores, Yosser Gavidia Flores, have been sidelined from lucrative business deals with the state, according to government insiders.
Mr. Maduro’s attorney general, Tarek William Saab, was fired, given a consolation post, and then fired again. Camilla Fabri, Mr. Maduro’s immigration envoy, lost her post. Days later, her husband was detained.
And then there’s Cuba’s foreign minister, Bruno Rodríguez. Since attending Ms. Rodríguez’s speech, he has watched his country’s decades-long alliance with Venezuela unravel in weeks.
As Ms. Rodríguez has tightened control, the dismissals grew bolder.
The first Maduro confidant to fall was Alex Saab, a Colombian-born businessman and Ms. Fabri’s husband, who has made billions from preferential food and oil trade contracts and is under indictment in the United States on corruption-related charges.
On Jan. 16, Ms. Rodríguez wrote on social media that Mr. Saab was no longer Venezuela’s industry minister, thanking him “for his service to the Fatherland” and saying he would “assume new responsibilities.”
Two weeks later, Mr. Saab was detained. American officials and Ms. Rodríguez are now negotiating his fate, which includes potential extradition to the United States.
People close to Ms. Rodríguez said she had overseen the detention of two other prominent businessmen close to Mr. Maduro’s family: Raúl Gorrín and Wilmer Ruperti. Mr. Gorrín also faces a corruption-related indictment in the United States.
Mr. Saab’s lawyer declined to comment. Legal representatives for Mr. Ruperti and Mr. Gorrín did not respond to requests for comment.
Ms. Rodríguez’s administration has neither commented on the detentions nor announced any charges, leaving Mr. Maduro’s allies to speculate who might be next.
Ms. Rodríguez in March widened the purge to the armed forces, firing Venezuela’s entire military leadership, including General Padrino López, once considered one of Venezuela’s most powerful men.
One Venezuelan general said that many see the dismissals of senior commanders as the start of a much deeper, U.S.-guided overhaul of Venezuela’s armed forces.
People close Ms. Rodríguez’s government said she had coordinated some replacements with the Trump administration. U.S. officials, they said, have also pressured her to go after American adversaries like Mr. Gorrín and Mr. Saab.
Ms. Rodríguez’s allies include younger chavistas with weaker connections to the movement’s roots. Some are scions of the governing party’s aristocracy more interested in the fruits of a market economy than in maintaining Mr. Chavez’s legacy.
Ms. Rodríguez has also found willing enforcers in Venezuela’s security forces who have pledged their allegiance, hoping to avoid retribution for decades of human rights abuses. Her new defense minister is Gen. Gustavo González López, Venezuela’s former head of secret police, who was placed under sanction by the Obama administration for crushing protests
Some former government opponents have been lured by career opportunities. Venezuela’s new envoy to North America and Europe, Oliver Blanco, had worked as personal assistant to an opposition leader.
The winners of Ms. Rodríguez’s economic restructuring include Venezuela’s traditional economic elites, who once sided with the opposition but made peace with chavismo. Their bet on stability over democracy has given them access to foreign markets and the U.S. banking system.
Western investors are other beneficiaries. They have recently been descending on Caracas’s luxury hotels searching for bargain assets in the oil, mining and tourism industries.
Only one senior minister in Mr. Maduro’s government remains in his post: Diosdado Cabello, the interior minister who oversaw the governing party’s repression apparatus.
Mr. Cabello is wanted by the United States on drug-trafficking charges and had clashed with Ms. Rodríguez in the past. But his connections to armed pro-government groups have also made him a valuable ally — and a risky target.
To hang on to power, Mr. Cabello has recast himself, from ruling party pit bull to a patriotic guarantor of stability.
“Let’s accompany our sister Delcy,” Mr. Cabello said at a government rally. “Let’s confide completely in the ability, work ethic and conscience of comrade Delcy.”
His adaptation has so far borne fruit. Mr. Cabello’s cousin and brother have kept their government jobs running Venezuela’s secret police and tax service. His daughter is Venezuela’s new tourism minister.
Inside the governing party, most officials have adapted, jettisoning their avowed anti-imperialism for a chance to stay in power.
One senior official said his colleagues did not trust Ms. Rodríguez, but felt they had no choice.
“We need her, and she needs us,” another said.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/18/world/americas/delcy-rodriguez-maduro-allies-venezuela.html