The arrest of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, exactly 36 years after a similar arrest of Panamanian President Manuel Noriega, has thrust U.S. foreign policy back into the future, just as Hollywood grapples with the question of U.S. imperialism in Oscar hits, including one by Paul Thomas Anderson. one battle after another Ryan Coogler’s sinner to josh safdie Marty Supre. Life began to imitate art when President Donald Trump bluntly declared the United States’ role in the country’s governance: “We will run Venezuela.” Marty Supre The ending credits drop: “Everyone Wants to Rule the World” by the 1980s great Tears for Fears.
But Anderson’s warAdapted from the ever-politically minded novelist Thomas Pynchon, the film has a certain extra resonance in 2026 due to the White House’s surprise attack on Venezuela and its role in an unlikely character in 21st-century foreign policy: Sean Penn. past generation X Bad boys are famous; Briefly married to pop icon Madonna He later reinvented himself as one of the greatest actors of his generation, winning an Oscar for 2003’s mystic river. Soon after becoming Hollywood royalty, Penn became a prominent supporter of Chavismo, which ultimately led to Maduro’s rise to power and Venezuela’s nearly three decades of economic collapse.
exist warCol. Steven J. Roqueca of the University of Pennsylvania satirizes right-wing Americans who are angry about immigration and especially left-wing radicalism, but his real-life politics display an almost hero-worship, certainly a strange bromance with Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez. In the late 2000s, when Payne first appeared in Caracas with Chavez, Venezuela’s oil revenues were still high, even as the government tightened its control over state institutions and the national oil company. The actor praised the leftist leader as a “model Democrat” and a Robin Hood-like figure who would be a champion of the poor, even at one point alluding to critics who call Chavez a dictator should be imprisoned.
For the Chavez government, putting Hollywood stars on stage means more than just a photo op. Payne’s presence became a soft validation of a project that has spooked investors, undermined private industry through expropriation and hollowed out checks and balances. Economists warn that the social model fueled by petrodollars is unsustainable, but political machinery increasingly prioritizes revolutionary narratives and global symbolism over technocratic discipline.
one battle after another
The Pennsylvania-Chavez alliance fits neatly into Venezuela’s broader strategy of attracting foreign celebrities and ideological fellow travelers to counterbalance Washington’s influence. This soft power approach humanizes a government that simultaneously centralizes power and pressures independent media while neglecting long-term investments in the oil industry that underpins the entire economy.
Initially, Payne was right to support Chavez, as Venezuela significantly expanded social programs and regional oil diplomacy, such as export subsidies through PetroCaribe. chavez A new hydrocarbons law was passed in 2001, significantly raising taxes and requiring the state oil company PDVSA to hold at least 51%–60% of the shares in “hybrid” joint ventures with foreign companies, reversing earlier liberalization of the industry. In the years since, the Chávez government forced foreign oil companies to accept most of the new PDVSA contracts or withdraw, leading to expropriation and arbitration cases from companies such as these Exxon Mobil and ConocoPhillips.
But Chávez was not as supportive of socialism in practice as he was in theory, and he laid off about half of PDVSA’s workforce after a strike in 2002-2003, causing the company to lose 18,000 valuable employees and hastening its operational decline. The country, which has the largest proven oil reserves, has experienced years of stagnant production since then, affecting maintenance, reinvestment and technical management of its fields and refineries.
When oil prices fell and mismanagement occurred, the country fell into hyperinflation, shortages and mass migration, eventually leading to a full-blown humanitarian crisis that lasted long after Chávez’s death and deepened under his successor Nicolas Maduro. as leader of the opposition Maria Corina Machado Tell wealth October In 2025, just weeks after winning the Nobel Peace Prize, Venezuela went from one of the richest and freest countries in the region to a “narco-terror state” with nearly a third of the population fleeing (many to Florida, not far from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort). this International Monetary Fund estimates By the end of 2022, Venezuela’s economy had declined by about 75%, despite center-left critics such as Center for Economic and Policy Research It is believed that this does not fully reflect the role of US sanctions.
Prior to the U.S. attack on Venezuela, President Trump had repeatedly mentioned the seizure of oil assets. “Not long ago they took all our oil,” He told reporters on December 18. “We want to get it back.” Trump’s legal basis for his crackdown on Venezuela, meanwhile, rests on narco-terrorism charges, and he issued an executive order in January 2025 that laid the groundwork for criminal organizations and drug cartels to be named “foreign terrorist organizations.” U.S. intelligence agency controversial Claims Maduro’s government is working with Venezuelan street gangs.
Payne also has a history involving narco-terrorism.
Shorty Detour
Payne’s attempts to use his fame to influence geopolitics did not stop in Caracas. In 2015, he secretly traveled to the Mexican jungle to meet Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman and arranged a interview rolling stones This comes just days after the drug lord was arrested. Mexican officials later said the meeting was “necessary” or “critical” to tracking Guzmán, noting that the intermediary who guided Penn and Mexican actress Kate del Castillo to the meeting was under surveillance.
January 2016, rolling stones “El Chapo Speaks” was published, Penn’s first-person account of the meeting in the Mexican jungle, complete with photos of the actor shaking hands with the world’s most wanted man and a video Q&A recorded afterward. Within hours, television networks and newspapers were showing Penn and El Chapo on split screens, treating the encounter as a mash-up of a Hollywood thriller and a drug soap opera rather than a sober look at the horrors of the cartel.
The ensuing media frenzy covered not only Penn but also the modern information marketplace. TV networks and digital media described the episode as a Hollywood-meets-drugs thriller, while press freedom advocates and Mexican journalists dismissed the blew up the story As a “vanity project,” Guzmán was given unprecedented control over the story and downplayed the cartel’s brutality. Payne later said that he “terrible regretIt’s him, not the failings of the drug war, that’s at the center of the story, but the episode further enhances his reputation as an unqualified actor-journalist on some of the world’s most dangerous conflicts.
Penn’s representatives at CAA did not immediately respond to a request for comment. His CAA page mentions that Payne worked for time, interview, rolling stone, and nationand was the first international journalist to interview Cuban President Raul Castro. (Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Cuban troops were killed in Venezuela as part of recent U.S. attacks, and Trump told reporters Cuba “is in a lot of trouble.”)
Today, Penn is attracting a different kind of attention one battle after anothercritics groups and awards adjudicators described it as a leading contender for best picture and performance after a strong performance at the major ceremony. The film’s dark satire of revolutionary politics and personal compromise emerges as Venezuela remains mired in low growth, fragile institutions and an ongoing exodus that is reshaping labor markets in the Americas. But Payne may not have imagined that when the conflict in which he played a clear role erupted, he would be in contention for another Academy Award. Indeed, everyone wants to rule the world.