President Donald Trump’s special envoy for special missions, Richard Grenell, is in Venezuela to deliver a direct message to President Nicolás Maduro. According to the State Department’s special envoy for Latin America, Grenell’s visit comes as Sen. Marco Rubio prepares for a historic trip to Latin America, reinforcing the Trump administration’s pressure campaign on Maduro’s regime.

The State Department’s special envoy for Latin America, Mauricio Claver-Carone, said in a press call Friday morning that Grenell’s mission is “very specific.”

The United States and President Trump expect Maduro “to take back all of the Venezuelan criminals and gang members that have been exported to the United States, and to do so unequivocally and without condition.” That, according to Claver-Carone, is “non-negotiable.”

Second, Maduro must release hostages “immediately”—not eventually.

“That doesn’t change President Trump and President Trump’s priorities, which he himself has said in regards to Venezuela and what he would like to see,” noted Claver-Carone.

“It doesn’t change the secretary’s position, obviously, in regards to Venezuela,” he added, referring to the recognition of elections, democracy, and democratic change in the country.

Trump, ever the businessman, has already declared, “We do not need Venezuelan oil,’ noted Claver-Carone. He further clarified that the message Grenell will present to Maduro “is not a quid pro quo. It is not a negotiation in exchange for anything.”

Claver-Carone said he would “urge” the Maduro government “to heed” Grenell’s message and the U.S. demands he puts on the table, “because ultimately, there will be consequences otherwise.”

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Ksenija Pavlovic is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of the Pavlovic Today, The Chief White House Correspondent. Pavlovic was a Teaching Fellow and Doctoral Fellow in the Political Science department at...

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