Despite an authoritarian regime's efforts to obstruct free and fair elections, Venezuelans turned out in large numbers to vote for their president last Sunday, hoping for change amid widespread political repression and a humanitarian crisis. The U.S. is deeply implicated in this turmoil, as the disputed election results underscore significant geopolitical stakes and can have a significant impact on American interests.

A government-controlled electoral commission declared Nicolás Maduro the winner of the election, claiming he received 51 percent of the votes. Yet exit polls and tallies by the opposition indicate that over 70 percent of Venezuelans supported the opposition candidate, Edmundo González.

Governments around the world have denounced the election as fraudulent and demanded evidence of Maduro's claimed victory. Leaders such as Argentine President Javier Milei and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni have expressed their solidarity with the Venezuelan people's desire for change. 

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has echoed these concerns, claiming that the election results do not reflect the true will of the Venezuelan people. On Thursday, Blinken affirmed that the U.S. recognizes González as the legitimate winner of the Venezuelan elections.

Even left-wing governments like Brazil and Colombia are pressing Maduro to substantiate his claim of victory, but no such proof has emerged. In a bigger turn of events, the Carter Center, one of the few entities invited to observe the Venezuelan election, condemned the electoral commission for its lack of transparency. 

Protests erupted nationwide in response to the disputed election, with thousands taking to the streets. Several statues of former socialist president Hugo Chávez were toppled in the unrest. Clashes with security forces have resulted in hundreds of arrests and at least 17 deaths. 

Strategic Concerns for the U.S.

Supporting the democratic aspirations of Venezuelans is crucial for U.S. interests. A free Venezuela will address key U.S. policy concerns such as the rise in illegal migration, untapped market opportunities, the growing influence of Iran and China in the region, and security risks for international commerce in the region.

Should Maduro remain in power, migration to the United States from Venezuela is expected to surge. Surveys show that over 40 percent of Venezuelans plan to leave the country if Maduro continues as president. This potential influx of refugees could strain U.S. immigration systems and social infrastructure, posing a major humanitarian and logistical challenge.

American firms will also miss out on substantial business opportunities in Venezuela if Maduro stays in power. The country's vast reserves of oil and uranium represent untapped markets that could enhance U.S. energy security. Investing in Venezuela's oil industry could help diversify energy sources and reduce dependency on unstable or unfriendly regions, leading to more stable energy prices and a reliable supply of oil for the U.S. market. 

Maduro's continued rule will also likely increase the presence of U.S. adversaries such as Russia, Iran, and China in the region. Iran plans to expand trade with Venezuela to $20 billion per year, China is heavily investing in the country, and Russia has signed multiple military agreements with the South American country. As Venezuela continues to distance itself from the democratic world, one can only expect these relationships to strengthen. And having a rogue state relatively close to the U.S. border represents security concerns to American businesses and international trade in general. 

To address these challenges, American policy makers need to adopt a more strategic approach. The current administration has focused on negotiating sanction relief for the Maduro regime in exchange for promises to hold free and fair elections. But this has proven insufficient, producing no positive changes in Maduro's behavior.

A new foreign policy approach should include a reassessment of institutions such as the United Nations and the Organization of American States. For years, these institutions have systematically failed to uphold the rule of law and human rights in Venezuela. Additionally, U.S. policy makers should establish measures to prevent regimes from exploiting international treaties and cooperation agreements. This includes sectors like finance and energy, where regimes have undermined democratic nations' interests. Finally, the methodology and effectiveness of sanctions should be reassessed. Despite a series of sanctions imposed by the U.S. on countries like Venezuela, Russia, and Iran, the International Monetary Fund projects economic growth for all these nations in 2024.

Failure to address these issues risks empowering autocrats around the world, jeopardizing U.S. national security, economic performance, and diplomatic standing.

The post Maduro Is Bad for Venezuela and Bad for the U.S. appeared first on Reason.com.

Nicolás Maduro is the authoritarian leader of Venezuela. Last weekend, he declared himself the winner of that country's presidential election—an outcome that is highly disputed; the Carter Center lambasted the Maduro regime's lack of transparency and said the process "cannot be considered democratic."

Thousands of Venezuelans have taken to the streets in protest. In response, the government has implemented a crackdown, killing at least 16 people and detaining a thousand more. Such behavior is entirely characteristic of Maduro, an outlaw who has faced credible accusations of drug trafficking, public corruption, and crimes against humanity. His unscrupulous leadership has plunged the country into depression and poverty. As Reason's Katarina Hall wrote, "Almost 8 million Venezuelans have fled the country amid hyperinflation, shortages of essential goods, and rampant corruption. Many more have expressed their desire to leave if Maduro remains in power."

Maduro's governing ideology is not a secret: He is a socialist. He is the successor to the leftist tyrant Hugo Chávez. He heads Venezuela's ruling Socialist Party. His policy prescriptions are in line with socialism: His government has instituted price controls, seized assets from private companies, and contributed to the country's hyperinflation problem. If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and wrecks the economy with a mixture of centralized planning, repression, and pure theft—well, it's a socialist duck.

So it came as something of a shock when a recent New York Times article that correctly described Venezuela's overall problems—and Maduro's perfidy in particular—nevertheless identified the government's economic policy as "brutal capitalism" rather than socialism. Here was The Times:

If the election decision holds and Mr. Maduro remains in power, he will carry Chavismo, the country's socialist-inspired movement, into its third decade in Venezuela. Founded by former President Hugo Chávez, Mr. Maduro's mentor, the movement initially promised to lift millions out of poverty.

For a time it did. But in recent years, the socialist model has given way to brutal capitalism, economists say, with a small state-connected minority controlling much of the nation's wealth.

Economists say what now? These economists are not identified by The Times; the given hyperlink redirects to a Times article about improvements in the Venezuelan economy. These improvements were due to the introduction of some market reforms, according to economists with actual names.

"Lifting some controls does not make Venezuela a capitalist country," writes George Mason University economist Tyler Cowen. "Moreover, the lifting of controls led to improvements."

When a small state-connected minority controls much of the nation's wealth—and maintains its grip on power by outlawing dissent and cheating in elections—then the ruling ideology is socialism, almost by definition. Maduro, it bears repeating, makes no secret of this: He is the leader of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela.

Socialists will complain, as they often do, that various socialist governments are not practicing actual socialism. Under their idealized system, socialists claim, the government's centralized redistribution of resources will be fair, equal, and democratic. Yet it certainly says something about such a system that it collapses into outright tyranny every time it is attempted. Socialist governance seems to require concentrating an extraordinary amount of power in elite government decision makers; this tends to produce a new ruling class, the widespread deprivation of political rights for everyone else, and crippling poverty.

Socialism is brutal, as the people of Venezuela know perfectly well. They understand that better than The New York Times.

This Week on Free Media

Amber Duke and I discuss MSNBC's confusion over what Sen. J.D. Vance (R–Ohio) really wants, President Joe Biden's plan to pack the Supreme Court, and weird affinity groups supporting Vice President Kamala Harris. (Apologies for my hoarse voice; I had too much fun at a Green Day/The Smashing Pumpkins concert the night before we filmed.)

Worth Watching

Like most fans of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), I am of the opinion that things have mostly gone awry since Avengers: Endgame concluded "The Infinity Saga." (Though I enjoyed several of the post-Endgame television shows on Disney+: WandaVision, Loki, Hawkeye, and What If…?) I was thus incredibly pleased to learn that the Russo brothers—who were responsible for many of the MCU's best films, including Endgame and Infinity War—are returning to rescue the franchise. Most notably, they have enlisted a familiar face: Robert Downey Jr., who famously portrayed Tony Stark/Iron Man, the original MCU superhero who gave his life to save the universe.

Downey Jr. will not be playing Stark again, thank goodness. While there are all sorts of ways to revive the character—alternate universes, time travel, etc.—doing so would cheapen his sacrifice at the conclusion of Endgame. Instead, Downey Jr. will play Victor von Doom, a beloved villain from the Marvel comics. It seems likely that this version of Doctor Doom will have some connection to Stark; as previously mentioned, the MCU has made use (some would say overuse) of alternate realities.

In any case, the recent reveal of Downey Jr. at Comic-Con in San Diego, California, was something to behold.

The post <em>The New York Times</em> Thinks 'Brutal Capitalism,' Not Socialism, Ruined Venezuela appeared first on Reason.com.

During Honkai: Star Rail’s Cosmodessy event, players were treated to a little personality test. Over the course of the minigame you’d be asked a series of questions, and in the end, based on your answers, you’d be assigned a personality linked to a game character. But the characters in the test weren’t the game’s main …

Read more...

No sit-ins on company dime: Yesterday, Google fired 28 of its workers after employees held sit-ins to protest the company's contracts with the Israeli government. The employees were part of a group called "No Tech for Apartheid," which protests the provision of cloud computing—called Project Nimbus—to the Israeli government.

"Physically impeding other employees' work and preventing them from accessing our facilities is a clear violation of our policies, and completely unacceptable behavior," said a company spokesman in a statement.

It's interesting watching tech companies decide they have no tolerance for this type of employee heckler's veto. Anti-Israel activism—which has for years involved protesting Project Nimbus, to the point that Israel even wrote a provision about employee activism into the contract it has with Google—has long been an undercurrent at the tech company. But just a few years ago, when companies wanted to be at the vanguard of wokeness, they treated such activism differently than they're treating it today.

Back in 2018, thousands of Google employees protested Project Maven, a contract with the Pentagon that would have used the company's AI technology to assess drone surveillance footage. Google higher-ups acquiesced to the activists' demands, saying they would not renew the contract and developing a set of AI guiding principles that landed squarely in the middle of the road. "While we are not developing AI for use in weapons," CEO Sundar Pichai wrote at the time, "we will continue our work with governments and the military in many other areas." After all, "these collaborations are important and we'll actively look for more ways to augment the critical work of these organizations and keep service members and civilians safe."

Give an inch, take a mile: Now, employees are understandably emboldened. "I refuse to build technology that empowers genocide," one Googler shouted last month during a tech conference keynote speech given by Barak Regev, head of Google Israel. The employee was promptly fired for "interfering with an official company-sponsored event."

Employees who apply to work for Google should probably be aware that the company has a long history of military contracts, both American and foreign. "The Federal Procurement Data System shows the Coast Guard bought licenses to Google Earth in 2005; the Army did the same in 2007," reported Wired. Not to mention: "The Pentagon had a sympathetic ear at the top. In 2016, Eric Schmidt, formerly Google's CEO and then Alphabet's executive chair, became chair of the department's Defense Innovation Advisory Board, which promoted tech industry collaboration with the agency."

"This is a huge escalation and a change in how Google has responded to worker criticisms," said one employee who protested yesterday. But the actual types of contracts Google goes after has not changed; it's merely that the company pivoted from soft on activism to much tougher, as it seemingly realized inmates cannot—and should not—run the asylum. Or, in this case, occupy the offices of Google Cloud's CEO during the workday.

Seating the jury: In Manhattan, former President Donald Trump's trial is proceeding more quickly and smoothly than expected, with seven out of 12 total jurors already picked.

The case against Trump concerns the falsifying of business records related to hush money payments he doled out following a sexual tryst with porn star Stormy Daniels. He's being brought up on 34 felony counts and could face a total of four years in prison if convicted. Given what a polarizing figure Trump is, there were concerns about how jury selection would go, but it appears to be proceeding rather smoothly.

The jurors so far include "a man originally from Ireland who will serve as foreman, an oncology nurse, a grandfather originally from Puerto Rico, a middle-school teacher from Harlem, two lawyers and a software engineer for Disney," reported The New York Times. Picking a truly fair and impartial jury, that's representative of New York as a whole, is a near-impossible task; it remains to be seen whether anyone will pull the wool over the eyes of those selecting them or become improperly enchanted by the media spotlight. (More detail on those who were not picked, and more on the questions jurors have been asked.)

Scenes from New York: New excuse just dropped for why state legislators can't put together a budget on time.

QUICK HITS

• NPR's new CEO appears to hate tech and the people who make it, arguing in support of the idea that "the rise of tech empires threatens society," wrote Pirate Wires' Sanjana Friedman. (Not to mention, she was apparently very triggered by Hereticon, the best social event of the year.)
• What comes next for Israel?
• Everything you ever wanted to know about the forgotten moral panic over beepers.
• As the International Space Station gets retired, are we entering the era of the private space station?
• Europoor discourse is raging on Twitter:

There's a European upper middle-class cope which basically says "yes, America might look richer, but there's no work-life balance, culture, or accessible healthcare." What I've learnt moving here is that, no, for genuinely comparable professionals, America is just much richer.

— Ryan Bourne (@MrRBourne) April 17, 2024

• "When the government of President Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela and his country's opposition signed an agreement in October to work toward free and fair elections this year, it was seen as a glimmer of hope after years of authoritarian rule and economic free fall," reported The New York Times. The U.S. lifted oil sanctions, hoping for the best. Now, merely six months later, "the Maduro government has made several moves that have dimmed the chances of legitimate elections, and a frustrated Biden administration on Wednesday announced that it was letting the sanctions relief expire."
• A better debate format is possible:

I would enjoy a debate between him and Trump where the moderators just teed them up, shame-free, to tell the most fanciful bullshit stories about themselves and their families. https://t.co/9QO20RsKBk

— Matt Welch (@MattWelch) April 17, 2024

• The libertarian take on Cruel Intentions we didn't know we needed.

The post Google Fires 28 appeared first on Reason.com.

Today, federal District Court Judge Drew Tipton issued a ruling in Texas v. Department of Homeland Security, rejecting a suit filed by a coalition of red states led by Texas, challenging the legality of the Biden Administration's CNVH parole program (also sometimes called "CHNV"), which allows migrants from four Latin American countries to enter the United States and live and work here for up to two years, if they can find a US-resident sponsor willing to support them.

Judge Tipton (a conservative Trump appointee) ruled that the states lacked standing to bring a lawsuit challenging the program. The plaintiff states argued Texas has standing because parolee migrants entering the state would lead the state government to incur various additional costs, thereby proving the necessary "injury in fact" required by Supreme Court standing precedent. But Judge Tipton concluded the evidence shows that the CNVH program actually reduces the number of migrants from these countries who enter the state. Thus, it doesn't increase the costs borne by the state, and therefore Texas hasn't suffered an "injury" sufficient to get standing:

To prove an injury in fact, Texas must show "an invasion of a legally protected
interest which is (a) concrete and particularized, and (b) actual or imminent, not
conjectural or hypothetical." Lujan, 504 U.S. at 560, 112 S.Ct. at 2136…. In the
context of state challenges to federal immigration policies, states have historically proven injury-in-fact by demonstrating the additional costs paid across state-funded industries because of additional aliens….

Texas's theory for standing "was based on allegations that the CHNV processes were likely to increase the number of CHNV nationals in the State and thus increase the State's costs…."  And as observed by Intervenors [a group of sponsors of CHNV participants], the trial record disproves this theory…. Intervenors argue that the undisputed data presented at trial confirms that the CHNV Parole Program has reduced the total number of individuals from the four countries, and consequently, Texas has actually spent less money as a result of the Program….

Judge Tipton canvasses the relevant Supreme Court and Fifth Circuit court of appeals precedent and finds that the right way to measure costs is to consider the net impact of the program in question, not just the costs that may be created by program beneficiaries taken in isolation. Since the evidence shows the program reduces the total number of CNVH migrants in Texas, it actually saves Texas money, and thus the state lacks standing. Earlier in the litigation, the state plaintiffs stipulated that only Texas's costs were to be considered, not those of the other states.

How does the CNVH parole program actually reduce the number of migrants from these four countries entering Texas? Because it allows program participants to come to the US legally without ever having to cross the southern border, many migrants who might otherwise have tried to enter Texas or other border states illegally instead seek legal entry under CNVH. Many go directly to their final destinations in other states by ship, plane, or other means of transportation. Even those who do enter through border states might not stay there very long.

I covered this point in much more detail in an amicus brief I filed defending the legality of the program, on behalf of the Cato Institute, MedGlobal (a medical non-profit serving migrants and refugees, among others), and myself. Our brief does not address standing. But, for reasons  explained in the brief, the alleviation of pressure on the border also matters for the merits of the case (which Judge Tipton didn't reach). See also my September 2023 article about the case in the Hill.

I am skeptical of narrow definitions of standing and would have preferred the court to uphold the CNVH program on the merits. However, Judge Tipton does make a good argument that this is the right result under current standing precedent. It is also broadly consistent with the Supreme Court's June 2023 8-1 decision in United States v. Texas, holding that many of the same red states that brought this case lack standing to challenge the Biden administration's immigration enforcement guidelines, even though the states argued that the administration's decision not to deport certain migrants increases states' costs (though there are also ways to potentially distinguish the two cases).

As David Bier and I explain in a November USA Today article, CNVH could do even more to alleviate border problems—and help migrants fleeing horrific oppression and violence—if the Biden administration were to expand it to cover more countries, and lift the arbitrary 30,000 per month cap on the number of participants. The cap has created a massive backlog of applicants.

And, while it may not be relevant to standing analysis (because of the indirect nature of such effects), the economic benefits of increased migration generally outweigh any additional costs to state and federal governments, especially given the immigrants also pay taxes.

This decision is likely to be appealed to the Fifth Circuit. Alternatively, the states might try to find some other way to get standing. The latter, however, may prove difficult if Judge Tipton's ruling stands. For the moment, however, the CNVH program can continue.

This case likely isn't over. But it's not a good sign for the states that they lost in district court despite the fact they chose to file in this district specifically because they were likely get Judge Tipton to hear the case. He's a conservative whom many observers expected to be sympathetic to the states' position.

NOTE: As indicated above, I filed  an amicus brief in this case defending the legality of the program, on behalf of the Cato Institute, MedGlobal, and myself. However, the brief does not address the issue of standing. What I write on that question represents solely my own views, and not those of Cato, MedGlobal, or anyone else.

I am, as discussed in the brief, a sponsor in the Uniting for Ukraine program, which is based on the same statutory authority as CNVH, but was not challenged by plaintiff states.

The post Federal District Court Rules Red States Lack Standing to Challenge Legality of Immigration Parole Program for Migrants from Four Latin American Countries appeared first on Reason.com.