118 HRES 1409 IH: Standing in solidarity with the Venezuelan people and condemning Nicolás Maduro’s attempt to steal the Venezuelan Presidential election.
U.S. House of Representatives
2024-08-02
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IV
118th CONGRESS
2d Session
H. RES. 1409
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
August 2, 2024
Ms. Wasserman Schultz (for herself, Mr. Diaz-Balart, Ms. Wilson of Florida, Mr. McCaul, Mr. Soto, Mr. Gimenez, Ms. Castor of Florida, Mr. Waltz, Mr. Moskowitz, Ms. Salazar, Mrs. Cherfilus-McCormick, Mr. Mast, Ms. Lois Frankel of Florida, Mr. Mooney, Ms. Titus, Mrs. González-Colón, Mr. Costa, Mr. Huizenga, Mr. Goldman of New York, Mr. Smith of New Jersey, Mr. Gallego, Mr. Schneider, Mr. Vicente Gonzalez of Texas, Mr. Connolly, Mr. Kim of New Jersey, Mr. Vargas, Ms. Garcia of Texas, Mrs. Torres of California, Ms. Manning, and Mr. Reschenthaler) submitted the following resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs
RESOLUTION
Standing in solidarity with the Venezuelan people and condemning Nicolás Maduro’s attempt to steal the Venezuelan Presidential election.
Whereas, on July 28, 2024, more than 11,000,000 Venezuelans turned out to vote in the Venezuelan Presidential election;
Whereas this election was preceded by over a decade of violent repression and persecution of political opponents, elimination of checks and balances, capture of state institutions, extrajudicial murder, arbitrary detention and torture, curtailed freedom of expression and the press, and systematic abuse of power by Nicolás Maduro and his regime;
Whereas the vast majority of the more than 8,000,000 Venezuelan citizens who have fled Venezuela under Maduro’s reign were denied their right to vote in this election due to excessive and arbitrary legal requirements to register;
Whereas opposition leaders María Corina Machado and Corina Yoris were banned from running for President by the regime-controlled supreme court despite Machado winning the opposition Presidential primary with over 90 percent of the vote;
Whereas the Maduro regime barred several groups of independent electoral observers from entering the country to monitor the election;
Whereas the Maduro regime has arbitrarily detained, forcefully disappeared, or forced into exile thousands of opposition political organizers, activists, human rights defenders, and others perceived to be critical of Maduro’s illegitimate rule in Venezuela;
Whereas, according to Foro Penal, the Maduro regime currently holds more than 270 political prisoners and has conducted over 15,000 politically motivated arbitrary arrests over the last decade in Venezuela;
Whereas Nicolás Maduro stated prior to the election that he had no intention of accepting defeat or providing for a peaceful transition of power;
Whereas the United States determined that these arbitrary and unconstitutional actions by the Maduro regime violated the terms of the Barbados Agreement, which provided for certain electoral conditions to be met and was signed by the regime and the opposition democratic Unitary Platform;
Whereas despite these conditions rendering the election neither free nor fair, Edmundo González Urrutia stepped forward to represent the opposition in the election for President in order to provide an alternative to Maduro’s tyranny;
Whereas, according to the opposition, official tally sheets from 24,384 voting centers in Venezuela, representing 81.21 percent of the total estimated vote count, were collected by observers;
Whereas the results from these tally sheets appear to demonstrate an overwhelming victory for González, who received 7,119,768 votes or 67 percent of the total, over Maduro, who received only 3,225,819 votes or 30 percent of the total;
Whereas the margin of victory for González is such that the remaining 18.79 percent of uncounted votes would not be sufficient to reverse the result;
Whereas the regime-controlled National Electoral Council refused to reveal the votes and instead announced that Maduro had prevailed in the election while failing to announce disaggregated results by polling station;
Whereas the announced results are not evidenced with any electoral data and appear to represent a blatant electoral fraud at the behest of Maduro;
Whereas hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans who gathered to peacefully protest the Maduro regime’s attempt to steal the election were met with arbitrary force and violent repression that has left hundreds arrested, at least 16 dead, and hundreds injured;
Whereas the Maduro regime has issued arrest warrants for María Corina Machado and Edmundo González on false criminal charges; and
Whereas the United States was joined by 16 Latin American and Caribbean nations, the European Union, and several other democratic governments in raising concerns about this apparent electoral fraud, requesting the release of full, transparent, and detailed voting data, and demanding that the Maduro regime honor the will of the Venezuelan people: Now, therefore, be it
That the House of Representatives—
(1)
recognizes Edmundo González Urrutia as the President-elect of Venezuela;
(2)
expresses solidarity with the Venezuelan people and Venezuelan Americans in their aspirations for a democratic future for Venezuela;
(3)
commends Venezuela’s pro-democracy opposition movement for their pursuit of a peaceful transition of power through electoral means despite the regime’s actions over the last year that rendered the election neither free nor fair;
(4)
condemns the Maduro regime’s cowardly and destructive attempt to steal the election and undermine the will of the Venezuelan people;
(5)
denounces the Maduro regime’s violent repression of Venezuelans peacefully demonstrating in support of democracy;
(6)
affirms that the will of the voters must be respected and a peaceful transition of power initiated;
(7)
calls for the imposition of new sanctions on the Maduro regime as well as sanctions targeting individuals and entities involved in subverting democracy and repressing the opposition, including foreign governments and non-state entities assisting the regime’s election subversion and repression; and
(8)
calls on the United States Government and all democratic nations to reject Maduro’s fraudulent claim of victory and employ all available diplomatic and economic means to pressure the Maduro regime to honor the true election results.