Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado presented President Trump with her Nobel Peace Prize medal during a private White House meeting Thursday, a dramatic and deeply symbolic gesture she framed as coming from the Venezuelan people themselves.
MXM Exclusive
Speaking to reporters on Capitol Hill after the meeting,
Machado said she handed Trump the medal during a visit that included a
private lunch, describing the moment as an expression of gratitude for
what she called his decisive role in confronting authoritarianism in
Venezuela.
A photograph
later posted by the White House showed Trump holding the framed medal
alongside Machado inside the Oval Office. The inscription praised
Trump’s “extraordinary leadership in promoting peace through strength,
advancing diplomacy, and defending liberty and prosperity,” and
described the medal as a personal symbol of gratitude offered on behalf
of Venezuelans seeking a free nation.
“The courage of America, and its President Donald J. Trump,
will never be forgotten by the Venezuelan people,” the inscription
read.
Trump acknowledged the presentation in a post on Truth
Social, calling it a “wonderful gesture of mutual respect” and saying it
was his “Great Honor” to meet Machado at the White House. He praised
her resilience, writing that she “has been through so much,” and thanked
her for what he described as an extraordinary show of appreciation.
Machado cast the exchange in historical terms, pointing to a
moment more than two centuries ago when the Marquis de Lafayette
presented Simón Bolívar with a medal bearing George Washington’s
likeness — a symbol of solidarity between revolutionary movements
fighting tyranny on different continents.
“Two hundred years later,” Machado said, “the people of
Bolívar are giving back to the heir of George Washington a medal — in
this case, a Nobel Peace Prize medal.”
She said the presentation recognized Trump’s “unique place”
in Venezuela’s struggle for freedom from the authoritarian regime of
Nicolás Maduro.
Trump had openly welcomed the idea days earlier, telling
Sean Hannity during an interview on Fox News that receiving the medal
would be a “great honor.” Machado had also publicly expressed her desire
to give or share the prize, calling Trump’s involvement “historic” and a
major step toward a democratic transition.