 Okay. I think we look good. So here we go. Welcome to what the F is going on in Latin America and the Caribbean. CodePink's weekly YouTube program of hot news out of the region. In partnership with friends of Latin America, Massachusetts Peace Action and Task Force on the Americas, we broadcast every Wednesday at 4.30 p.m. Pacific, 7.30 p.m. Eastern on CodePink's YouTube channel. Tonight, I am joining conversation with my friend and CodePink teammate, Leonardo Flores. Leo holds a bachelor's degree in philosophy from the University of Maryland and he dropped out of a master's program at the University of Maryland School of Public Policy to work as an analyst on U.S.-Venezuela relations. Leonardo was born in Venezuela and maintains close ties to social movements that have transformed the country over the past 20 years. Some of you may remember our November 3rd panel discussion about all of the important elections happening across Latin America throughout the month of November, including November 7 presidential elections in Nicaragua, November 14 legislative elections in Argentina, November 21 presidential elections in Chile first round, and regional and municipal elections in Venezuela, which we refer to as mega elections. And then this coming Sunday, November 28, there will be presidential elections in Honduras. Tonight, we will focus on the November 21 mega elections in Venezuela, where I served as an international election observer, and of which Leonardo has written a terrific article, which has been published in a number of places, Common Dreams, Mint Press, and LA Progressive. And I'm going to share that link in the chat with the audience. So, welcome, Leo. We've got a lot to talk about tonight. Thanks so much, Terry. Thanks for the warm welcome. And for folks who don't know, Terry is our electoral observation superstar. I think you're going to be in four elections in one month, right? Nicaragua, Venezuela, Honduras, and then a special election in Mexico in about two weeks, right? Yes. Yeah. A special election in this not at each state. So, yeah. So I'm getting lots of practice, I guess. And meeting a lot of terrific people and seeing some really important issues come to the forefront across the Americas. It's been really, really a profound experience. And I'm so thankful for all of you supporting me in this work. Yeah. And let's just jump right into Sunday, right? Because it was a big, big day for Venezuela as a whole. I mean, we'll get into that. But in particular, I think for the left, right? Because the Socialist Coalition, what's known as the Great Patriotic Poll, of which the United Socialist Party event as well as a part, they won 19 of the 23 governorships with three going to the opposition. One remains too close to call. I think they're doing some final audits, and that's in the state of Barinas, which is actually Chavez's home state. So it's really interesting that the opposition managed to make some inroads there. And the Socialist Coalition also took at least 205 of the country's 335 mayoral races, including in, I think, they won in 21 of the 24 state capitals and including the capital of Caracas. So big victories for Chavez's in the states as well, sorry, in the capitals as well. And we're talking about elections that had 70,000 candidates running for office, or running for 3,082 offices. 90% of the vote was counted within hours of polls closing, not just counted, but counted and verified. So that's kind of a big achievement. And really, it's par for the course in Venezuela. And turnout was 42.2%, which isn't all that impressive. But when we compare it to midterm elections here in the US, it's pretty much on par with what happens here in the US. And on that same day, there were, as you mentioned, there were elections in Chile, the first round of presidential elections. And turnout there was only 47%. So I think a lot of presidential elections. Presidential, yeah. And so I think folks who focus on this turnout number are really kind of being unfair to Venezuela, and they obviously have this kind of angle to play against the country. But let's talk about what you witnessed, because I know that these weren't the first elections you've been in in Venezuela. So why don't you talk a little bit about what you've witnessed in the past, and what then you witnessed on Sunday, and if anything had changed? Well, okay, I think this was my fourth time officially observing elections in Venezuela. The first was for the National Assembly elections in 2015, and then presidential elections May of 2018. And then I was fortunate enough to go back and observe for the National Assembly elections in December of 2020. So that was a nice five-year to see the cycle complete. That was a really special experience. And then, of course, Sunday the 21st with the regional elections, I was part of the Caracas route. So we spent the day visiting eight polls, which was a really nice cross-section of different colonias in the city. And for me personally, the process is exactly the same. Every time I've observed, the only change has been since I first observed elections was the electronic voting machines have, or it's a new addition, or a new, they've been updated. And so the technology stays current. And so that's really the only change I've seen as far as the actual voting process. It's exactly the same. Everybody knows what to do. One of the things that always impresses me, because this is such a different relationship that people in Venezuela have with their government, and especially with their military, the military preserves the peace at every polling center. And the polling centers are all public schools. And so you have military personnel, which some people that they've not experienced this before initially find it very intimidating. But once you start interfacing and watching how Venezuelan voters interface, you clearly see that they are there in a very friendly manner. They're there to maintain the peace within the line out front of the voting center so that people don't start arguing or intimidating one another over how they're going to vote. And that's really important. Although you Venezuelans love to talk politics and argue among yourselves about politics, it's a fabulous cultural thing to watch among all of you. It's very passionate and it's extraordinarily informed conversations. But also, the military is fully informed and educated about the electoral process. So if any voter has a question about what to do, where to go, how to vote, the military can assist in that. And also, very importantly, the military assists anyone with any form of disability get into the polling center and get to the Mesa that they are assigned to vote in. And I think, you know, so if you have a mobility issue or in some visual impairment or whatever, they can help help. And I have witnessed a woman being carried up the stairs. I think when we were at Francisco Miranda Voting Center, there was a woman that had a walking impairment and they carried her. She was carried up the stairs to her voting table. It was really, you know, that's not a relationship with the military in the United States. So it's a really, it's a really different thing to witness and a really beautiful thing to witness. As far as the actual procedure, the only thing that was different in December and of course, still on Sunday were the COVID-19 protocols, where everyone is required to wear a mask out anyway in Venezuela, but particularly in the voting centers. And people line up six feet apart out front of the polling center. Only so many people are allowed in to the center at one time. And then within each Mesa or room, as we would know, know it in the United States, people again, line up outside six feet apart, have your masks on, your hands are sanitized before you enter the polling center and they are re-sanitized before you go into the Mesa to vote. They are sanitized when you are done voting. And then when you leave the Mesa, they're sanitized at that point. And then when you leave the polling center themselves, your hands are re-sanitized. So the protocol is very simple, very clear and uniformly enforced. We saw this throughout the day at all eight polling centers we visited. The day was very calm. Lines were long in the morning. It's typical throughout Latin America or at least the numerous countries I visited. Older people tend to vote first thing in the morning. They line up and so we saw lines as early as 6, 6.30 in the morning. But very efficiently administrated. The voting is quick and easy because it's all done electronically and it's all done, I think, what we call user-friendly interfacing is what we would call it in the States where the whole ballot is a graphic and you just point on it and go and you're done. It's very quick, very easy, very user-friendly voting system. And then as we, what's that? Oh, sorry, I just wanted to emphasize one of the things that you said about how there's been no difference in the system other than the COVID protocols in the five years. And the updating of the machines. Yeah, but particularly that there has been no difference in the system since 2015 because that's an important year because that's when the opposition scored their biggest electoral victory during the whole 22 years of the Bolivarian Revolution was in 2015 when they took a near-supermajority in the National Assembly. And what's important about that is that those elections were basically carried out using the exact same system, using the exact, under the exact same conditions, well, not the economic conditions, but under the exact same kind of electoral political conditions. And in those, the opposition went big, but every other election that where they participate, they always kind of come up with excuses as to why they didn't win. But it's clear to me that if it's the same system and you can win sometimes, but not other times, then it's not an issue in the system. It's an issue maybe with your platform, right? Yeah, exactly. You know, one thing, one thing, I was there in December of 15 when the opposition won, you know, very big. It was, yeah, it was a big win for them that December. But, you know, the president as soon as the, you know, the audits were completed and the numbers were official, the president immediately recognized the results, immediately went on national TV and recognized the results. And the country maintained the peace through that night and through the ensuing week, there was no, it was a peaceful transition of the National Assembly. And that doesn't get talked about enough, I don't think, particularly to have witnessed such a large win by the opposition. People accepted it. And I think it's really important for the audience to understand that President Maduro went right immediately, you know, recognized the win, told the nation about it, and everybody peaceably moved on until the opposition was disappointed again in 2017. And I like that you brought up the issue of peace, because I think that's one of the hopes that we can take away from the selection, right? Because this was the first time in four years that the entire opposition participated. You've had a faction of the opposition, the extremist faction that is kind of led by, or at least represented by Juan Guaible, who has been supported financially and logistically by the U.S., that who would, we're talking about a faction of the opposition that has called for sanctions, begged the U.S. for sanctions, has asked for a U.S. invasion, has carried out attempted coups, has carried out an attempted mercenary invasion. And they apparently finally seem to recognize, and when I say they, I mean, at least the base of the party, because some of the party leaders including Juan Guaible, he apparently didn't vote at all. He boycotted personally, so which is ridiculous, because especially because in his home state of La Guaida, it was actually a very close race between the PSUV candidate and the candidate of the opposition, one of the opposition coalitions. And so the fact that Guaible didn't vote, I mean, if he has all this support, then he could have easily voted in the morning and rally the supporters to come vote. And that could have flipped La Guaida for them, but he decided not to. He decided to keep playing this game of boycotting, which is ludicrous because the opposition knows it's a failed strategy. And so I think it's really, really so important that the full opposition participated this time around, because I think it hopefully is going to mark a return to a certain normalcy in Venezuela, right? A normalcy in the political atmosphere. I mean, obviously there are many, many issues outstanding relating to the economy, relating to politics itself. But the fact that you have this, the bulk of the opposition saying, okay, let's participate is hopefully going to calm things down politically. It's going to lead to greater stabilization. And we've already kind of seen economic stabilization. So I'm going to talk a little bit about some of the stats. But afterwards, I want you to talk about what you've seen because you've visited Venezuela more than I have over the last 10 years, I think. And so in Venezuela, for example, there was a poll that came out in August, run by an opposition pollster. And they found that 50% of Venezuelans consider themselves to be better off this year compared to last year or the year before. That's hugely important because already there's a sense that the worst is behind us in Venezuela. We have Credit Suisse, which is a financial firm, is projecting 5.5% economic growth for Venezuela this year. That's also really big because despite the sanctions, which are still destroying the economy, I think the economy has turned a corner a bit. There's never going to be a full recovery unless the sanctions are lifted. But the worst is behind us, we hope. And actually, I just saw on Twitter a couple of hours ago, Rafael Correa tweeted that someone is projecting 11% growth for Venezuela next year. So even the international community seeing what's going on and part of what's going on is that Venezuela has found a way to avoid the sanctions. And I think also that a lot of these kind of transnational corporations and these financial firms are betting on the fact that the EU and possibly the US will start lifting sanctions. I think that's kind of what's driving that particular projection because that was kind of the plan all along with that, you know, the two sides, the maludal government and this cuan guay del faction of the opposition, they started engaging in dialogue in August. They continued in September. And one of the things to come out of that dialogue was the opposition's participation. And not only that, but it was also the electoral observation of the European Union, a panel of electoral experts from the UN and also the Carter Center. And before we talk about observation, I do want to get your thoughts on how you've seen Venezuela kind of change since the economic war really kind of hit Venezuela hardest than compared to now. Well, I will say, you know, I saw really, really great, you know, days when Chavez was alive. And I've seen what President Maduro has had to guide the country through. And for me, I would say probably like November of 2016, really until about maybe 2019, really, really, I, there are very few people I think who could really understand, unless you've been here, how very hard those years were with probably 2017 being the absolute bottom of the, you know, where people were standing in line for what, you know, necessities were available, food, bathroom, all of it. And a lot of that was false scarcity, was created scarcity by private enterprise, hoarding products and not, you know, distributed, distributing them into the marketplace. You know, the sanctions regime that really officially started in March of 2015 with President Barack Obama's executive order, declaring Venezuela a national security threat to the United States. So that was really hard. But I think that I noticed Christmas of 2019, I was there just that was just a personal visit. And that year, the government was using the Petro, the cryptocurrency, the Venezuelan cryptocurrency to pay state employees. And oh my gosh, it was the first holiday shopping I had seen in a number of years. And the stores were more full. But then going back in December of 2020, everything is in the stores. I mean, the stores are fully stocked. Most of the products, this is really kind of a neat thing, are from China and many other products from Iran also. So you can see what the sanctions are doing as far as, you know, not allowing Venezuela to interface with the United States and many of its allies and being blocked out of the overnight banking system. It's creating this alliance between other nations that are strongly sanctioned as well. And it's a really, it's a really beautiful thing. But the stores are fully stocked. And also the the overt accepted use of the US dollar has helped is more or less, I would say, and correct me if I'm wrong, it's kind of a rudimentary form of foreign investment for the country to have citizens being able to use the US dollar. And but yeah, the commerce is profoundly different and more improved. And I think I shared with you the day I arrived in Caracas that the traffic from the airport to downtown has reappeared. That has not been the case for a number of years, but actually traffic on a Sunday afternoon from the airport to downtown was quite heavy. And the gas lines are much shorter. And there's clearly commerce. You know, commuter traffic is back, the stores are full. So it was it's a it's a real, you know, real, real improvement. And of course, the people and of course, so when the voters say their lives are better today than they were last year, that for sure is true. And I'm happy that they're admitting it. Regardless of political party, it's a great thing that people are connecting the dots because that doesn't happen in every country where people understand that the economy is good because of the government policy. Absolutely. And so let's talk about observation a little bit in the week prior to the election, you had the White House, excuse me, the State Department, one of the assistant deputy secretaries or whatever the title is, gave a speech to the Atlantic Council, where he basically said that he implied that nothing was that the vote count itself was going to be fine. But that in that he gave a message to the observers from the EU, the UN and the Carter Center. And he basically told them that they have they have to focus on everything that happened prior to the election, because they know they have no arguments as to what happened on Sunday itself. So so instead, they're trying to focus on what happened prior to the elections. They're claiming it was an uneven playing field, which again, I mean, it's the same playing field as 2015 when the opposition won big. So why can't they do the same? But then on the day after the elections, we had the White House issue statement, basically just saying it was a sham election in, you know, not those exact words, but that was the implication that that the middle government had somewhat somehow twisted the results and that the opposition wasn't getting fair shake. And then after that, we had the EU observer, the leader of their delegation, gave a press conference, where she explained that the final EU report is going to come out in December. But for now, she what she noticed was something that was technically reliable, meaning, you know, the actual results on Sunday were the real results. And she focused a little bit on a couple of issues. And I'm going to ask you about one in particular, but one of the things she said that really struck me was that the observers had been there for several weeks prior to the elections, the EU ones, and they said that they saw state resources being used in 30% of pro government rallies, while they were also used in 2.5% of position rallies. So one of the things I'm going to be really curious about when I see this report is to see how they kind of calculated that, right? Because it's not that easy to know when state resources are being used at a rally unless they're talking about security, in which case, you know, maybe state resources should be used for anyone having a big rally, especially during COVID. But what really caught my eye was she said that their observers witnessed so-called red points in something like 20 states, the puntos rojos. These are, you know, supposedly places where the government urges their people to vote and they give them like supposed benefits after they vote. That's not really what they are, but that's what the kind of the rhetoric from the right is about these books. So first, I want to ask you, did you witness any of these in your on your electoral route? And I know that I have to say, I didn't see one. And did you talk to anyone that saw one? Because I know observers generally stay at the same hotel and they talk a lot amongst each other about what they witnessed, kind of a, you know, a recap of the day. Did you hear of anyone who is seeing one of these red points? No. And I mean, we did not talk about it. And if there was one on our route Sunday, the 21st, I didn't, I didn't see it. But it is something that would most definitely have been brought up. I was with a group of observers from Namibia, Ethiopia, Belgium, and Norway. It was a really wonderful mix. So we didn't stay the groups that went out. And we went, we were assigned eight different locations. One, two in Caracas, and then the other six were in various parts of the country. So it was a really nice sample of the electorate on Sunday, because we were sent out in eight teams across the country. And in mixed groups. So no one observed by country or by nationality. We truly, we truly observed as internationalists, which was a really wonderful experience. But no, I can't say I've seen one in the past. And on election day, and it was appropriate, it was the appropriate distance away from the polling center. I saw nothing on Sunday, the 21st. And what was the kind of the general sense among the observers you talked to? Because obviously here in the US, they're going to focus on what the EU says, because the Carter center isn't putting out its report for another several weeks, and the UN report is private for the Secretary General and for Venezuelan authorities. But what did the folks you talked to, what did they think about the elections? Well, everybody's always impressed with the Venezuelan system of voting, particularly people from the United States, because it's really like I was saying, beginning just for the first thing you said, well, why is the military at the polling center? And then when you, and then when you started interfacing and understanding how different the relationship is between Venezuelans and their military, that's the first thing. But it's really, people are very impressed with one how easy it is to vote, how clear the instructions are, how quickly you can vote. The biggest thing for those of us from the States is that the elections are held on Sunday, so that there's really no hindrance to participating. You don't have to arrive to work late. You don't have to leave work early. You don't have to call in sick. You don't have to skip classes if you're a student. You don't have to get daycare. Your parents, it's so easy. And Sunday allows for a much greater participation of the electorate to vote. Yeah. And just to highlight what one of the observation groups said, the Council of Electoral Experts in Latin America, which is one of the most prestigious observation teams in all of the. They're impressive. They're very impressive. And they were there. They were there for two months before the election. And they witnessed every single audit. There were 16 audits. And one of the things they highlighted really was that the fact that the audits of the electoral system were broadcast live on TV. I mean, it couldn't. I mean, we're talking about a process that couldn't be more transparent and secure. And the CLA, as it's known, the Council of Electoral Experts of Latin America, they said, you know, we're talking about a robust, trustworthy and secure system. And so I think that's really what we should be talking about when it comes to elections in Venezuela. And it's so unfortunate that we have to... That's why people participate so heavily, because they know the system is secure. It's fair. It's transparent. It's absent of front. Even Leonardo in December of 2020, that fabulous meeting that you arranged for our Code Pink delegation in December, when we met with the opposition, that part of the opposition actually has always participated, which is the majority. Even, you know, they opened up that meeting saying, you know, we believe they want to change things, but they want to do it in a constitutional manner, which means participating in the electoral process. And they open the meeting saying we believe the Venezuelan electoral process is free, fair and absent of fraud. And it is. And that's why participation was so high, because people trust the system. And speaking of, and as we kind of wrap up, I want to take advantage of the fact that you're in Honduras right now to give me kind of your thoughts about what we might see Sunday in Honduras. Not necessarily prediction of who will win, but just kind of the concerns that electoral observers in Honduras have right now. Well, I can tell you the first thing. I arrived yesterday. And I was detained in immigration because I declared, as we all have had to do, you know, that I'm an international observer. And that raised eyebrows, the OAS delegation was allowed to enter, you know, with diplomat through the diplomatic line. And the rest of us have had to go through normal migration. And it was once I was, you know, declared to be an international observer. That's when all the questions started. And they sent me into, you know, a sec, a room where I had lengthy secondary questioning. And I will also say yesterday, a group of journalists from Mexico arrived, they arrived in San Pedro Sula and took a bus down to meet the rest of us in Tegucigalpa. They were detained for four hours upon entering the country. We were all eventually allowed to enter. I have to say, that has never been my experience in Venezuela. I've never seen that happen to anyone entering Venezuela to observe elections, regardless of political affiliation. The Venezuelans allow everyone to come. And I think that's really clear with having invited, you know, the EU and UN and the Carter Center, you know, to participate on the 21st. So that is the first profound difference in the electoral processes, who is allowed to come and who's not. And so, yeah, it was a two hour delay for me to enter the country. I was eventually allowed to enter. It is, it's very oppressive here. I will say, and I've shared this with you before, despite how difficult life has been and is now, you know, largely improving in Venezuela. Venezuelans have maintained what, you know, that, that alegria, that openness and, and lightness of life and people still talk to you on the streets and treat you in a friendly manner that is not, you know, that is not the general ambiance atmosphere here in Honduras. You can feel, you know, that people have been oppressed for a very long time, 100 years or more. And, and also, you know, they're still suffering the effects of the coup in 2009. And hopefully that will change on Sunday. I think at the very least people feel hope this electoral cycle. And, and, and that is, that's evident. So that's a, that's a, that's a big change that there's going to be some real competition on Sunday for the presidency. And we haven't seen that since, you know, 2009 and earlier. So there, yeah. And people are talking about that. And that is really, that's great. I mean, that makes you see as an observer that, that everyone, that there is, you know, full participation this time around where people feel they actually have some hope. Well, thanks so much for having me on WTF Terry and good luck in Honduras and good luck to the people of Honduras because they've been suffering quite a long time. Yeah. So, well, let's remind our guests that our audience said, you've been watching what the F is going on in Latin America and the Caribbean CodePinx weekly YouTube program of hot news out of the region. We broadcast every Wednesday at 7 30pm Eastern. We're also now available on Apple podcast and Spotify. So you can find us there as well. And also be sure to catch CodePinx radio every Thursday morning 11am Eastern broadcasting simultaneously on WBAI out of New York City and WPFW out of Washington DC. CodePinx radio is also available on Apple podcast and Spotify. So, so, and catch Leo Nardis. Where can they find your article, Leo? Oh, well, the best place I think is CodePinx.org and go to the pink tank, but it's also on Common Dreams, Mint Press, Venezuelan Analysis, LA Progressive, Popular Resistance. Excellent. This is five reasons why the buy the PSU one on Sunday. It's a really good article. So thank you. So, okay, everyone. Thank you. We'll see you next week and next week we'll be broadcasting live from Tegucigalpa Honduras and we'll be talking about the electoral results, the presidential electoral results on Sunday, November 28th. So thanks, Leo. Great conversation. Yeah, really enjoyed talking with you this evening. Likewise, Terry. Okay. Happy Thanksgiving.