Venezuela’s opposition leader, María Corina Machado, said on Sunday, 25 October 2026, that she has returned home after more than ten months in exile. On X she wrote: “I am here. With you.” The return is a fact. An arrest or a new election is not.

Her ally, former presidential candidate Edmundo González, confirmed the arrival: Machado is on Venezuelan soil. He said he will soon join her to move the country “toward freedom.” A statement. Not a governing timetable.

Machado was photographed at Mass in a church in Lara state, surrounded by supporters. An adviser said in September that in the preceding weeks she had tried seven times to return and was denied each time. Reports circulated that the US had delayed her return; Washington denied them.

She left Venezuela in January, a month after departing by speedboat under cover of darkness to accept the Nobel Peace Prize in Norway. Around the same time, US forces detained Nicolás Maduro. The Trump administration backed Delcy Rodríguez as interim leader; an oil deal followed on terms favourable to the US — background, not the day’s core event.

What she does next is unclear. She has previously said she would run again if an election were held. Her ability to return, the BBC notes, depended on Trump administration approval. Secretary of State Marco Rubio: conditions for a safe return stem from US-supported reconciliation talks. Trump, asked on Sunday: “I don’t know anything about” it, and hoped she was safe.

Spokesperson David Smolansky called the return “a major step” toward a democratic transition and verifiable elections. A step, not a vote already held. No invented arrest. No invented election result.

Image: Plaza Bolívar, Caracas, 15 July 2011 — Javiermartinez76, CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons. The place, not a portrait.

Sources consulted: Venezuelan opposition leader María Machado returns after months in exile — BBC; Opposition leader Machado returns to Venezuela from exile — AP News.