Two weeks after United States special forces abducted Venezuelan President Nicholas Maduro, opposition leader Maria Corina Machado visited the White House for her first in-person meeting with US President Donald Trump.
With Venezuela’s future uncertain, and Trump seemingly in a position of authority to determine who might lead the South American country, Machado placed her recently won Nobel Peace Prize in the hands of a man who has coveted the award for years.
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The two posed for a photo in front of the Declaration of Independence in the Oval Office, and Trump smiled big as he clasped onto a large golden frame encasing the medal.
But does the prize now belong to Trump, and could it change the US president’s course of action when it comes to Venezuela?
Did Trump accept the Nobel Peace Prize?
ABC News later quoted an unnamed White House official confirming that Trump had agreed to keep the award.
“It was my Great Honor to meet Maria Corina Machado, of Venezuela, today. She is a wonderful woman who has been through so much,” Trump wrote in a post on his Truth Social platform on Thursday.
“Maria presented me with her Nobel Peace Prize for the work I have done. Such a wonderful gesture of mutual respect. Thank you Maria!”
Why did Machado win the Prize?
Machado, 58, is the leader of the Venezuelan opposition party, Vente Venezuela. She is also one of Maduro’s staunchest critics.
In 2023, she won the Venezuelan opposition’s presidential primary, placing her in a prime position to challenge longtime leader Maduro in the 2024 presidential elections.
However, Venezuela’s top court, the Supreme Tribunal of Justice, upheld a ban stopping Machado from running for office. The court backed government claims that she supported US sanctions, was linked to a weapons plot through her party and had helped cause losses to Venezuelan assets like the US-based oil refiner Citgo and chemicals company Monomeros, which operates in Colombia.
Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia, a diplomat, replaced her as presidential candidate for the opposition bloc. Machado campaigned for him.
However, Maduro won the election, continuing to hold onto his presidential seat, which he has held since 2013. The election was disputed and earned widespread accusations of fraud from within and outside Venezuela, including from a panel of United Nations experts. Nine Latin American countries demanded a review of the election results in the presence of independent observers.
After spending more than a year in hiding and defying a decade-long travel ban imposed by Venezuelan authorities, Machado secretly left Venezuela in December to travel to Oslo to collect her prize.
While announcing her win, the Nobel Committee said Machado was “receiving the Nobel Peace Prize for her tireless work promoting democratic rights for the people of Venezuela and for her struggle to achieve a just and peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy”.
Why did Machado give Trump the Nobel Prize?
Trump’s longstanding desire to win the Nobel Peace Prize is well known. Before the prize for 2025 was announced, Trump repeatedly suggested that he deserved to win it and claimed it would be a “big insult” to the US if he did not.
Speaking at the UN General Assembly (UNGA) in New York in September 2025, Trump said, “Everyone says I should get the Nobel Peace Prize.”
Trump added, “I ended seven wars. No president or prime minister has ever done anything close to that.” The wars he claimed to have ended include conflicts between Cambodia and Thailand; Kosovo and Serbia; the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Rwanda; Pakistan and India; Israel and Iran; Egypt and Ethiopia; and Armenia and Azerbaijan. Subsequently, Trump also oversaw the signing of the Gaza ceasefire deal.
In reality, analysts have pointed out, several of these conflicts are still alive – Thailand and Cambodia have fired at each other since their truce; Israel has killed more than 450 Palestinians in Gaza since the ceasefire came into effect on October 10; and tensions remain high between India and Pakistan.
Trump has openly expressed his frustration with not winning the Nobel Peace Prize. “I single-handedly ENDED 8 WARS, and Norway, a NATO Member, foolishly chose not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post on January 7.
The Norwegian Nobel Committee, which determines who wins the prize, is independent from the government of Norway.
The White House posted a picture of Trump and Machado with the framed prize. The text on the frame read: “Presented as a personal symbol of gratitude on behalf of the Venezuelan people, in recognition of President Trump’s principled and decisive action in pursuit of a free Venezuela.”
After her meeting with Trump, Machado told reporters it was “excellent” and that she presented Trump with the medal as “a recognition for his unique commitment with our freedom”.
Does that mean the Nobel Prize is Trump’s now?
Under the statutes of the Nobel Foundation, a Nobel Prize cannot be revoked, reallocated, or transferred to another person. Once a prize has been awarded, the decision is final and permanent.
The statutes of the Nobel Foundation are the formal rules that govern how the Nobel system works in practice.
While Trump can hold the physical prize, it has still been awarded to Machado, which is a decision that will continue to stand.
The Nobel Peace Center account on X, the official account of the museum about the Nobel Peace Prize, reiterated this in an X post on Wednesday.
“A medal can change owners, but the title of a Nobel Peace Prize laureate cannot,” the post says.
What does this mean for Venezuela?
On January 3, Maduro, 63, was abducted by special forces of the US during an operation in the Latin American country’s capital, Caracas.
Since his abduction, Venezuela has been confronted by questions over who will lead it – and whom Trump would back for the role.
The US president quickly ruled out the possibility of supporting Machado as the leader of Venezuela. “She doesn’t have the support within or the respect within the country. She’s a very nice woman, but she doesn’t have the respect,” Trump said about Machado during a news conference on January 3.
On January 4, The Washington Post reported, quoting two anonymous sources close to the White House, that Trump had withheld support from Machado because he was upset that she had accepted the Nobel – even though she had dedicated it to him – instead of refusing it.
One of these people said Machado accepting the award was the “ultimate sin”, while the other person told the Post: “If she had turned it down and said, ‘I can’t accept it because it’s Donald Trump’s,’ she’d be the president of Venezuela today.”
Instead, Trump has backed Maduro’s deputy, Delcy Rodriguez, who was sworn in as Venezuela’s interim president. Rodriguez has expressed eagerness to work with the US.
During the meeting between Machado and Trump, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said that while Trump had been looking forward to meeting Machado, he stood by his “realistic” view that Machado lacks the backing required to lead the country for now.
Meanwhile, Trump spoke to Rodriguez over a phone call on Wednesday. In a post on Truth Social that day, Trump described the call as “very good”.
“Many topics were discussed, including Oil, Minerals, Trade and, of course, National Security. This partnership between the United States of America and Venezuela will be a spectacular one FOR ALL. Venezuela will soon be great and prosperous again, perhaps more so than ever before!”
Rodriguez described the conversation as long, productive and courteous, saying they discussed a bilateral agenda aimed at benefitting both countries.
Machado left the White House carrying an official gift bag – a red paper bag stamped with Trump’s gold facsimile signature. It was less clear whether she departed with any better sense of where she stands in Washington’s plans for Venezuela’s future.