Venezuela's Rodríguez in New York for UN Assembly and Trump Meeting

Venezuelan Acting President Delcy Rodríguez arrived in New York on Monday, September 22, 2026, to lead her country's delegation to the 81st United Nations General Assembly, with a scheduled meeting with President Donald Trump set for Tuesday. The encounter, announced by the White House and described by US Ambassador to the UN Mike Waltz as a pullaside during a reception rather than a formal bilateral meeting, will be the first face-to-face meeting between Trump and Rodríguez since US forces captured Nicolás Maduro in Caracas in January and brought him to New York to face federal drug-trafficking charges. It also marks the first meeting between a sitting US president and a Venezuelan leader in more than 11 years. Rodríguez landed at Teterboro Airport in New Jersey and was received by Vice President for Economy Calixto Ortega, Deputy Foreign Minister Oliver Blanco, and John Barrett, the US chargé d'affaires in Venezuela, a reception that underscored the rapid normalization of bilateral relations since January. She is scheduled to address the General Assembly on Thursday, Venezuela's first in-person presidential-level participation since 2018.