The Room Where It Happened: A White House Memoir

by John Bolton

Buoyed by Guaidó’s successful return, I was prepared to do the most we could to increase pressure on Maduro, starting with imposing sanctions on the entire government and taking more steps against the banking sector, all of which we should have done in January, but which we ultimately put in place. At a Principals Committee to discuss our plans, Mnuchin was resistant, but he was overwhelmed by others, with Perry politely explaining to him how oil and gas markets actually worked internationally, Kudlow and Ross disputing his economic analysis, and even Kirstjen Nielsen chiming in for stricter sanctions. Pompeo was largely silent. I said, again, we had only two choices in Venezuela: win and lose. Using an analogy from the 1956 Suez Canal Crisis, I said we had Maduro by the windpipe and needed to constrict it, which made Mnuchin start visibly. He was worried that steps in the banking sector would hurt Visa and Mastercard, which he wanted to keep alive for “the day after.”39 I said, as did Perry and Kudlow, there wouldn’t be any “day after” unless we increased pressure dramatically, the sooner the better. This wasn’t some academic exercise. As for Mnuchin’s concern for the harm we would cause the Venezuelan people, I pointed out that Maduro had already killed over forty during this round of Opposition activity, and hundreds of thousands risked their lives every time they went into the streets to protest.40 They weren’t thinking about Visa and Mastercard! The poorest people did...