Aftermath of Regime Change: After US Forces Raid Caracas, US Detains Core Figure of Venezuela's Former Political-Business Network Across Borders

Following the Caracas raid, the US has pointed its anti-corruption drive at core figures in Venezuela's former political-business network. According to BBC reports, 62-year-old Colombian Álvaro Pulido was arrested in a Sunday operation carried out by a US Homeland Security task force. The US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and the State Department had previously offered a US$10 million reward for information leading to his whereabouts.

US federal prosecutors have charged Pulido in two separate federal indictments with laundering over US$2 billion in funds connected to a bribery scheme involving the Venezuelan government; he is scheduled to make his first appearance in federal court on Tuesday. Citing the US Attorney's Office, BBC reported that prosecutors allege that Pulido and four co-defendants bribed Venezuelan government officials to obtain contracts for supplying food and medicine to poor Venezuelans, and are accused of substantially overcharging the Venezuelan government, laundering the resulting profits through overseas accounts, including bank accounts inside the United States. Prosecutors also charged Pulido with conspiring with another Colombian businessman, Alex Saab, to launder US$350 million through Florida bank accounts from a bribery scheme involving Venezuela's official foreign exchange system.

The location of Pulido's prior detention itself serves as a thought-provoking footnote. According to BBC reports, he had been held since March 2023 in a prison inside Venezuela, facing charges of embezzling profits from the state oil company PDVSA. From detention in Caracas to becoming a defendant in a New York federal court, the US Department of Justice has not explained the specific legal procedures and basis by which Pulido entered US jurisdiction, was extradited, or was transferred; the relevant process remains opaque.

The Pulido case is directly tied to the dramatic reshaping of Venezuela's political landscape. BBC's reporting pointed out that Saab had previously been a figure of real power within the Venezuelan government and maintained a close relationship with then-leader Nicolás Maduro; Maduro appointed Saab as industry minister in 2024. According to BBC reports, Maduro was taken away in a US military raid on Caracas and transported to New York to stand trial on drug trafficking charges. The legal authorization, the basis under international law, and the operational details of this military action against a sitting head of state have not to date been independently verified; likewise, the establishment procedures, representativeness, and constitutional continuity with the ousted government of the US-backed transitional government lack cross-verification from multiple sources.

Following this reshaping of the landscape, Saab's fortunes reversed rapidly. According to BBC reports, less than two weeks after Maduro was taken away, the transitional government removed Saab from his ministerial post and extradited him to the United States in May; Saab pleaded guilty last month to money laundering charges. Pulido's current detention and upcoming prosecution in the United States constitute an extension of the same process: the commercial networks of the ousted regime are being severed one by one from their original location and collectively transferred into US judicial jurisdiction.

What warrants further questioning is the choice of targets and timing of this anti-corruption campaign. The food and medicine procurement contracts mentioned in BBC reporting have for years operated against the backdrop of US comprehensive economic sanctions on Venezuela, which have eroded normal import channels; the specific flow of funds, the actual impact on ordinary Venezuelans, and the operational logic of the transitional government itself in procurement, foreign exchange, and public services have yet to be systematically disclosed. The US high-pressure purge of the former political-business network, juxtaposed with the low-key handling of the legality of its own military operations and the governance details of the substitute regime, constitutes selective law enforcement in another sense — anti-corruption, on the extension line of regime change, is being selectively pursued.