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Rep. Salazar on Maria Corina Machado

Republican Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar of Florida says that Venezuela's opposition leader Maria Corina Machado has "earned" being in power. Machado will be meeting with President Trump this week.
Jan 11 (07:18)

TRANSCRIPT FOR: “REP. MARIA ELVIRA SALAZAR SAYS VENEZUELA'S MARIA CORINA MACHADO HAS "EARNED" PRESIDENCY”

MARGARET BRENNAN:
00:05:10

But do you know why the Trump administration isn't publicly demanding the release of the Americans that are being held? Listen, maybe we do not know some things that are happening. And Rubio said it the other day. I do understand, and I am sure Rubio knows the area very well, and he knows who the characters are. And we are definitely taking this with solid steps. We do not want to make any mistakes. And I am sure that the political prisoners will be coming out and that we're not giving them, meaning Diosdado and Delcy, any type of leeway for them to really run the country. We will see-- like, it happened. It happened two, three weeks ago. Let's give them a little bit more time before we see more results. Very quickly, the president tweeted today, "Cuba gets no more money, no more oil." The CIA assessment is that that regime in Havana is not necessarily in peril, even though the president's saying they are. What are you hearing? Well, look, I represent the city of Miami, the heart of the Cuban exile community. And those words are, like, magical. It's been 65 years. Cuba is really a center of power for our enemies-- Iran, Russia, China. And now I think they're getting the memo. And Cuba, it's hanging by a threat-- by a thread, I should say. The threat that Cuba has represented to the United States has been immense. They have no water. They have no electricity. They have no food. They have nothing. So if you think that Maduro is weak, Cuba is even weaker. And now they do not have one drop of oil coming from Venezuela. So that could be the beginning of the end. Well, Mexico's stepping up and providing them some. We're going to have to watch what happens there next.

MARIA ELVIRA SALAZAR:
00:07:11

And that is a very big mistake, very big mistake from Madam Sheinbaum. All right. Thank you very much, congresswoman.

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