Since the election of President Nicolás Maduro to his first term in April 2013, the South American country’s once-thriving economy has collapsed under the weight of its failed socialist policies, causing inflation to rise by a whopping 1,300,000%, and leaving the nation’s poor struggling to survive. More than 21% are suffering from hunger, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization.
“The situation is extremely dire for the huge percentage of the population that lives in poverty,” Andrés Guilarte, a young Venezuelan political activist who is now living in the United States, told the Washington Examiner. “Almost 90 percent [of the country] is living with less than $1 per month.”
Guilarte has dedicated his life to fighting back against the rise of tyranny and the trampling of basic political freedoms. His term at the Central University of Venezuela was interrupted by government officials who intimidated freedom fighters on campus with tear gas. After leaving Venezuela in early 2019 to work as an intern with the Cato Institute in Washington, D.C., he has been sharing his story with the world.
Guilarte argues that socialism has taken the people of Venezuela to a “primitive survival mode.”
“Every single day, people are facing choices between buying food or paying for bus tickets, eating garbage, not being able to find medicines or not having money to pay for it, [as well as] water and electricity shortages,” said Guilarte.
“Millions of people, due to the constant electricity and water shortages, had to go back to using oil lamps and gathering water in big plastic containers. Every single one of the factors that make the humanitarian crisis as bad as it is is growing day after day, and people are leaving the country by any means they can.”
Young America’s Foundation President Ron Robinson, who has dedicated his career to ensuring that increasing numbers of young Americans understand the importance of individual freedom, argues that the Left has purposely avoided the topic.
“There are at least three issues Democrats and their accomplices wanted to avoid discussing: the oppression and failure of their socialist colleagues in Venezuela, a vigorous Trump economy with the lowest unemployment in 50 years, and investigations closing in on the origin of the erroneous ‘collusion’ claims,” Robinson told the Washington Examiner.
While the humanitarian crisis in Venezuela appears to lack newsworthiness among the liberal media, Guilarte remains hopeful that the people of this country stand behind Venezuela’s freedom fighters.
“I trust that the majority of the American people are aware of our existential fight against socialism and that they fully support us,” said Guilarte.
Brendan Pringle (@BrendanPringle) is a writer from California. He is a National Journalism Center graduate and formerly served as a development officer for Young America’s Foundation at the Reagan Ranch.
