The recent US assault on Venezuela and the kidnapping of president Nicolás Maduro and first lady Cilia Flores has shocked the globe and thrown the hemisphere into turmoil. But the Trump regime’s attacks on Venezuela are not new, and form part of a historical continuum of US efforts to isolate and undermine Venezuela and its socialist project. 

Join Center for Political Education, W.E.B. Du Bois Movement School for Abolition & Reconstruction and Haymarket Books for Part 1 in a two-part series that will provide on-the-ground reporting and crucial historical background for understanding the origins of the US obsession with regime change in Venezuela, and the threat to US hegemony posed by the Bolivarian Revolution and its socialist alternative.

***Register through Ticket Tailor to receive a link to the live-streamed video on the day of the event. This event will also be recorded and captioning will be provided.***

Speakers:

Cira Pascual Marquina is a popular educator at the Pluriversidad, El Panal Commune's educational initiative in the working-class barrio of 23 de Enero in Caracas. She is also a founder and member of the Communal Democracy Network.

Chris Gilbert is a professor of political studies at the Universidad Bolivariana de Venezuela, contributing editor at Monthly Review magazine, and the author of Commune or Nothing!: Venezuela’s Communal Movement and Its Socialist Project (Monthly Review, 2023), among other books and articles.

Together, Gilbert and Pascual Marquina are the creators and hosts of Escuela de Cuadros, a Marxist educational television program and podcast. They are coauthors of Venezuela, the Present as Struggle: Voices from the Bolivarian Revolution (Monthly Review, 2020) and the book series Resistencia comunal frente al bloqueo imperialista (Observatorio Venezolano Antibloqueo, 2021–2025).

Geo Maher is a movement educator who has taught at colleges and universities, San Quentin State Prison, and the Venezuelan School of Planning in Caracas. He is founding coordinator of the W.E.B. Du Bois Movement School for Abolition & Reconstruction in Philadelphia and author of five books including We Created Chávez (Duke, 2013) and Building the Commune (Verso, 2016).

Carlos Martinez is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Latin American and Latino Studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz. He is the co-author of Venezuela Speaks! Voices from the Grassroots (PM Press, 2010) and co-editor of All This Safety Is Killing Us: Health Justice Beyond Prisons, Police, and Borders (North Atlantic Books, 2025).

Stay tuned for Part 2: War in the Caribbean: US Imperialism and the New Monroe Doctrine, featuring Marisól LeBron, Alex Aviña, and Jorge Cuellar, January 21st at 7pm EST.

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This event is sponsored by Haymarket Books, W.E.B. Du Bois Movement School, and Center for Political Education. While all of our events are freely available, we ask that those who are able make a solidarity donation in support of our important publishing and programming work.