Nicolás Maduro

Since the onset of Venezuela’s economic and humanitarian crisis back in 2015, around 6.8 million people have fled the country in search of refuge. The most popular destinations include neighboring countries Colombia and Brazil, as well as a host of other Latin American countries. Many who can afford it have also found safe passage to Europe. Yet many of Venezuela’s poorest and most disaffected are setting their sights on another destination entirely: the United States. At the height of the country’s troubles between 2015 and 2018, the number of Venezuelans apprehended by US officials never exceeded 100 people a year. Fast forward to 2022, and more than 150,000 Venezuelans have arrived this year already.

Visibly, and with very little pretense, Tunisia is sliding into tyranny. In the last two years, its president, Kais Saied, has frozen and dissolved the country’s parliament and threatened its former members with prosecution. He has dismissed an errant prime minister. He has ruled by decree. He has quashed the high judicial body attempting to scrutinize his changes to the constitution and replaced it with a new organization filled with hand-picked appointees. Accusing his opponents of planning their own coup attempt, Saied has faced down months of protests over each of these individual changes with uncommon steeliness. Saied’s hold over the instruments of government and his comradery with the brass of the army appears near total.