DORAL, Fla. — On a recent rainy afternoon near Miami, Maria Alejandra Barroso made her daily trek to Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church before heading to work and prayed for the Trump administration to succeed in ousting Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.
"Every day I pray for it to be peaceful and for innocent people to not get hurt," she said in an interview on Tuesday.
Barroso, 44, a server at a restaurant, emigrated from Venezuela in 2022 and has a pending asylum case. President Donald Trump's immigration policy changeshave stripped legal protections for hundreds of thousands of Venezuelan immigrantsand put more of themat risk of deportation. But Barroso said that ending Maduro's almost 13-year reign is far more important to her than any worries over possible deportation, since it would mean returning home.
"I'm not here because I want to be. It was necessary. I have friends in prison just for thinking differently," she said. "We want democracy and peace. I completely trust the actions of President Trump."
In Doral, a city in Miami-Dade County with the highest concentration of Venezuelans in the U.S., discussions revolve around whether Trump should get more involved in Venezuela and the controversy over the U.S. attacks on alleged drug boats. Talk about Trump's pressure campaign on Maduro is prevalent everywhere, and Venezuelans in the enclave are bubbling with hope for Maduro's ouster.
The Trump administration has taken a more antagonistic stance toward Venezuela recently.
The U.S. military has moved thousands of troops and a carrier strike group to the Caribbean Sea in recent months and conducted strikes on alleged drug boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific. Trump said in an interview with Politico on Tuesday that Maduro's "days are numbered" and refused to rule out a U.S. ground invasion. On Wednesday, the U.S.seized an oil tankeroff the coast of Venezuela.
Alejandro Márquez, 64, echoed the sentiment of Barroso outside the church, saying he would be on the first plane back to Venezuela despite being a U.S. citizen and living here since 2013.
"I'm focused on reconstructing Venezuela on the side of security," said Márquez, who is a former sub-secretary of defense and security in the northwestern state of Zulia.
Trump won over60% of Doralin the 2024 election. While some Venezuelans expressed skepticism about whether his pressure campaign will work, they're still checking their phones constantly to find news on social media or the latest information a friend forwarded on WhatsApp. Many Venezuelans in South Florida are using global flight tracking apps to monitor planes arriving and departing Venezuela, to try to glean whether there's any changes that may indicate some kind of activity.
A few miles from the church, at a popular cafeteria-style Venezuelan restaurant, El Arepazo, employee Rosangel Patiño said business is a little slower because people are afraid to go out amid Trump's immigration crackdown. But she said all the patrons that walk in are constantly talking about the situation in Venezuela and looking for the latest news.
"Everyone is glued to social media," Patiño said.
Victor Montero, a business owner who was having lunch at the restaurant, said when he gets home from work each day he scours YouTube for the latest information.
"I feel the same way as all Venezuelans. It gives me so much happiness to know that at any moment, it can all end," said Montero, who came to the U.S. from Venezuela 22 years ago. "The family in Venezuela is going through a very difficult time."
Trump has accused Maduro of being the leader of "a narcoterrorist organization" and of flooding the U.S. with drugs. Some experts say Trump's actions are aimed at regime change,a charge that Secretary of State Marco Rubio denied.
Whilesome experts have cautioned against the challenges of regime change in Venezuela, many Venezuelans, including Nobel Prize winner and opposition leader Maria Corina Machado,credit Trumpwith attempting to restore democracy in their country. In 2019, during his first term, Trump used a "maximum pressure" campaign against Maduro, including sanctions andrecognizing an opposition politicianas Venezuela's rightful leader.
"Venezuelans in Florida want Maduro gone. They want the situation in Venezuela resolved," said Eduardo Gamarra, a professor of politics and international relations at Florida International University.
"But a lot of them are concerned about what it means for them in terms of their situation with immigration," Gamarra added. For Venezuelans who don't have legal immigration status and who may be at risk of deportation, questions about how any conflict or change in Venezuela could affect them are top of mind, he said.
Gamarra, who does polling and focus groups, says he finds people are afraid to answer questions about immigration because they fear retaliation. "People are being very cautious when you ask them about Trump," he said, adding it makes it harder to do polling.
Venezuelans started coming to Florida in large numbers in the early 2000s after socialist Hugo Chávez rose to power. The first wave of Venezuelans were business-savvy, mid- to upper-class professionals. Some even owned second homes in Florida already.
But the situation deteriorated drastically when Maduro, a former bus driver and activist, took power in 2013 following the death of Chávez, his mentor. And that led toincreasingly desperateVenezuelans arriving in South Florida, many with little in their pockets. Under Maduro's rule the country's oil-driven economy has faced adecade-long collapsedue to mismanagement, corruption and sanctions. An estimated80% of residentslive in poverty. To solidify his iron grip, Maduro has usedrepression, arbitrary arrests, torture and disappearances. He eliminated independent media, criminalized civil society and banned opponents from public office. Around8 million Venezuelanshave fled under his rule.
Maduro drew worldwide scrutiny and condemnation last year following presidential elections in which he lost by 40%but ignored the resultsand stayed in power. The Biden administration and governments of other countries officiallyrecognized opposition leader Edmundo Gonzálezas the winner.
Outside El Arepazo, Rafael Landa, who came to the U.S. five years ago, questioned whether Trump's actions will lead to regime change in Venezuela.
"I don't think it's going to be as easy as people think," he said as he opened the restaurant door. "I'm not getting my hopes up."
