President Donald Trump announced that Venezuela has agreed to receive all Venezuelans illegally living in the United States.

Devin Pavlou Digital Producer

Maduro agrees to accept Trump deportees into Venezuela

Feb 2

Devin Pavlou Digital Producer

By Devin Pavlou (Digital Producer)

President Donald Trump announced that Venezuela has agreed to receive all Venezuelans illegally living in the United States. Trump made the announcement on social media Saturday, Feb. 1.

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In addition to accepting the migrants, Venezuela will also supply the transportation for them, Trump said.

“Venezuela has agreed to receive, back into their country, all Venezuela illegal aliens who were encamped in the U.S., including gang members of Tren de Aragua,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.

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The announcement came days after Trump’s U.S. envoy Richard Grenell met with Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. On Friday, the U.S. announced Grenell had secured the release of six American hostages from Venezuela. U.S. officials said the reason the six were being held remains unclear.

The White House said Grenell’s two main priorities during the trip were to negotiate a hostage release and get the country to accept deportees. The U.S. did not make financial or other concessions to Venezuela during the trip, according to Grenell.

“The only award for Maduro was my physical presence, the first senior U.S. official to visit the country in years,” he told the Wall Street Journal. “It was a big gift to him to have a visit by an envoy of President Trump.”

Does the Trump administration recognize Maduro?

However, the White House made it clear that the trip did not mean the Trump administration recognized Maduro as Venezuela’s legitimate leader.

Maduro was elected to a third term in 2024. During that time, former President Joe Biden called the election fraudulent and recognized Maduro’s opponent, Edmundo González Urrutia, as the rightful winner.

What’s the Trump’s administration relationship with Maduro?

During the meeting, Maduro expressed a continued relationship with the Trump administration, saying, he and Trump “have made a first step. Hopefully it can continue.”

Trump celebrated the new agreement with Venezuela. This was the latest South American country to accept migrants who were illegally in the U.S.

On Jan. 26, Columbia agreed to accept military aircraft carrying migrants deported from the U.S. Columbia’s president briefly denied U.S. military aircraft from dropping off deported migrants in the country.