By Emmanuel Thomas l Friday, October 10, 2025
PARIS, France—In a move that links the political theater of Europe’s far-right with the fraught struggle for democracy in South America, French opposition politician Marine Le Pen has offered warm congratulations to Venezuelan opposition figure María Corina Machado following her win of the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize.
The prominent leader of France’s National Rally party, known for its nationalist and Euroskeptic platform, declared that Machado’s accolade was an “honor” for the broader fight for freedom.
Ms. Le Pen praised the Venezuelan activist for what she described as a struggle for “freedom, democracy, and pluralism,” aligning her own political movement with the democratic aspirations of a figure who has long defied the authoritarian regime of Nicolás Maduro.
This endorsement casts Ms. Le Pen, often criticized for her party’s anti-establishment and protectionist views, as a champion of international democratic resistance, particularly one led by a woman.
Background: A ‘Brave and Committed Champion’
The Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded the 2025 Peace Prize to Ms. Machado “for her tireless work promoting democratic rights for the people of Venezuela and for her struggle to achieve a just and peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy.”
The committee lauded her as “a brave and committed champion of peace” and a “unifying figure” for Venezuela’s fractured opposition.
Ms. Machado, a former member of the National Assembly and the leader of the Vente Venezuela party, has been a decades-long, unflinching critic of the socialist governments of Hugo Chávez and Nicolás Maduro.
Her activism has come at great personal risk; she has endured political persecution, including a controversial ban from holding public office that prevented her from running in the 2024 presidential election. Despite this, she has remained a key figure in mobilizing the opposition and advocating for peaceful, democratic change in a nation suffering from a severe humanitarian crisis and a near-total collapse of democratic institutions.
Ms. Le Pen’s public support draws a distinct line between her party, which has recently sought to soften its image, and the global defense of liberal democratic principles, a platform more typically occupied by centrist and established political figures.
For the Venezuelan opposition leader, who has garnered widespread international support, the Nobel Prize is seen as a powerful tool in her continued push for free and fair elections.
The congratulatory statement from Ms. Le Pen highlights a complex web of global political alignments, where opposition figures across different continents and political spectrums—from French nationalism to Latin American democratic resistance—find common ground in the language of freedom and anti-authoritarianism.
