Attacks on Venezuela

Who is Delcy Rodríguez, Venezuela’s vice president and next in line to succeed Maduro

President Donald Trump says that Delcy Rodríguez will do “whatever” the US needs.

Carolina Cabral

Update: Jan 3rd, 2026 12:30 EST

After reports early this morning that Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, First Lady Cilia Flores, were detained by the United States, attention shifted to Delcy Rodríguez, the country’s executive vice president. Under Article 233 of the constitution, Rodríguez would be the official to temporarily assume the presidency in the “complete absence” of the president.

Trump says US will run Venezuela

At a press conference at Mar-a-Lago following the extraction of Nicolás Maduro, President Trump said the United States would run Venezuela “for the time being.”

Pressed on how that would work in practice, Trump said Delcy Rodríguez was being sworn in as president. He added that while Rodríguez had been appointed by Maduro, he expected her to do “whatever you need.”

“She really doesn’t have a choice,” Trump said of Rodríguez’s options, explaining that she had held a lengthy conversation with Marco Rubio, the U.S. secretary of state.

Delcy Rodríguez’s background

Rodríguez, 56, was born in Caracas. Her father was a founder of the Socialist League and died while in police custody during the government of Carlos Andrés Pérez. That experience helped shape the political convictions that would later define both her career and that of her brother, Jorge Rodríguez, who currently leads the National Assembly.

Delcy Rodríguez was close to Hugo Chávez

A close ally of the late Hugo Chávez, Rodríguez was appointed minister of the presidency in 2006. Her legal background played a key role in that promotion: she is a trained lawyer with postgraduate studies in labor law and political theory completed in London and Paris.

After Chávez’s death, Rodríguez steadily climbed Venezuela’s power structure. She served as foreign minister from 2014 to 2017, then became president of the National Constituent Assembly in 2018, the body created by Maduro to sideline the opposition-controlled legislature. Since that same year, she has held the post of executive vice president, while also serving as oil minister, and has emerged as one of the most internationally recognizable figures in the Venezuelan government.

Delcy demands proof of life for Maduro

Following statements by Donald Trump claiming that Maduro and Flores had been detained, Rodríguez phoned the state television network to demand proof of life for both. She is one of the few senior officials to have spoken publicly since the early hours of the morning, alongside Diosdado Cabello, the interior minister and vice president for citizen security.