SALT LAKE CITY — Utahns gathered Monday at the federal building in downtown Salt Lake City to protest the actions of the Trump administration over the weekend in Venezuela.
The event, organized by Salt Lake Indivisible, aimed to raise concerns to Senators Mike Lee and John Curtis about United States Special Forces capturing a foreign leader outside the U.S. People held signs and signed letters as well.
"I'm really upset about so many things that are happening in this country. This seems like just another trampling on the Constitution,” said Sarah McConkie, who drove from Eagle Mountain to be part of the protest. “I agree that Maduro does not seem like a great leader by any stretch of the imagination, but things have to be done in the way that we outline in the Constitution, and to just go in like that is really concerning to me."
National News
‘I’m a decent man’: Venezuela’s Maduro pleads not guilty in US federal court
"Doing it under false pretenses, claiming it’s for drugs, and really it being a ploy to take the oil reserves Venezuela has,” added Jim Catano.
Carlos Trujillo, an immigration attorney in Utah, understands their frustration.
“With the fact that there was no congressional approval for this, there was also frustration that the law doesn’t provide that a president can just go into another country and take somebody the way that they did it,” he said.
Trujillo moved to the U.S. from Venezuela 25 years ago.
"My parents simply had the vision of, look, things are just not looking good,” he explained. “So we put together the little money that we had and we bought me a plane ticket and put me on an airplane to the United States.”
He paid close attention to the U.S. actions in Venezuela on Saturday.
"Many Venezuelans [and I] are extremely joyful in the fact that Maduro is facing justice, that he has been apprehended,” Trujillo said. “But in the other side of that, as far as the transition, as far as what is expected to take upon Venezuela, as far as democracy, a little bit concerning."
Trujillo now has a family here and helps others navigate political persecution in his home country, including Josh Holt.
In 2016, Holt was in Venezuela meeting his now-wife.
"He was spotted by the military and they came upon him, they planted weapons, they planted grenades and they accused him of being a CIA agent, they accused him of pretty much coming to take down the Venezuelan government,” explained Trujillo.
Holt and his wife were detained for two years. They came back to the U.S. in 2018. Trujillo said what happened over the weekend brought them some relief.
"It was a rough, tough time for them,” he said. “They went through some despicable things that no human being should go through."
Trujillo hopes something good comes soon.
"We're hoping that really, all countries can participate on the pressure of restoring democracy,” he said.
