Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro talks to high-ranking military officers on his inauguration day for a third term, in Caracas, in January, 2025.Ariana Cubillos/The Associated Press

Venezuelans are legendary partiers, and the images of dictator Nicolas Maduro in handcuffs aboard a U.S. ship early Saturday morning provided the first excuse in a very long time for a mass celebration – not just on the streets of Caracas, but in Bogota, Buenos Aires, Santiago, New York and places between, where a third of Venezuela’s population has been forced to flee the misery and violence spread by Mr. Maduro’s rule.

But by Sunday, while the rest of the world focused on the legality of U.S.’s President Donald Trump’s stealth military raid and the morality of externally imposed regime change and potential occupation, Venezuelans had begun to ask more sober questions: Had the regime really changed at all? Or was it just the same old far-left “Chavista” administration, the one that had ignored an overwhelming election defeat in 2024 and banned opposition parties from running in the 2018 election, in a more Washington-friendly flavour?

Venezuelans in Canada cheer Maduro’s toppling, worry about what comes next

Had Venezuelans really won their country back – and, importantly, was it the sort of country they could return to?

Mr. Trump’s claim at his Saturday morning press conference that........

© The Globe and Mail