Updated October 10, 2025 at 10:37 AM EDT
Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado has won this year's Nobel Peace Prize for "her struggle to achieve a just and peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy."
The announcement of Machado as winner of the prestigious award came as a surprise after intense speculation that President Trump could be a wildcard winner after negotiating a Gaza ceasefire this week.
But the Norwegian Nobel Committee said on Friday that Machado's tireless work promoting democratic rights for the people of Venezuela was "one of the most extraordinary examples of civilian courage in Latin America in recent times."
Machado, who has been barred from running for president and lives in hiding, "keeps the flame of democracy burning amid a growing darkness" in President Nicolás Maduro's "brutal, authoritarian" Venezuela, the committee said.
"Oh my God, I have no words"
In a video of Machado receiving the news posted to the Nobel Prize website and social media, she expresses shock at winning.
"Oh my God, I have no words." she says.
"I am just one person. I certainly do not deserve this," she continues, adding it is the "achievement of a whole society."
The 58-year-old has been one of the staunchest critics of Maduro's ruling United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), which first came to power in the late 1990s under former President Hugo Chávez. Maduro succeeded Chávez in 2013.
An industrial engineer by profession and a former legislator in the Venezuelan National Assembly, Machado has been shot at and targeted by federal prosecutors. Last year, she was supposed to be the opposition's presidential candidate in July elections but was banned from running.
Instead she threw her backing behind a different party, led by Edmundo González Urrutia. The pro-Maduro National Electoral Council claimed that President Maduro had won a third term with 51% of the vote, but the opposition said the vote had been rigged and evidence showed González had won by a landslide.
Election observers noted numerous irregularities in the polls, which were widely dismissed by the international community as neither free nor fair.
Thousands of Venezuelans took to the streets in protest, but they were quashed by the government, and Machado went into hiding in August 2024 after threats to her life. However, she did not flee the country and remains in Venezuela where she has vowed to fight on.
"I trust the Venezuelan people, and I have no doubt that the result of our fight will be the liberation of Venezuela. Maduro is totally isolated, weaker than ever. And our people want and need to know that I'm here with them," Machado told NPR's All Things Considered last year.
Machado is not without her critics. She is considered by many to be a right-leaning politician and beyond her activism, details of what kind of policies she would enact if she were to lead Venezuela remain.
Next year for Trump?
There were 338 candidates for the Nobel Peace Prize this year — 244 individuals and 94 organizations. Bookies on Thursday said the odds favored Trump and Sudan's Emergency Response Rooms, a volunteer network helping civilians despite great risk in the midst of the country's civil war.
Trump has never made a secret of his desire to win the prestigious accolade. Last month, he claimed to the United Nations General Assembly, "Everyone says I should get the Nobel Peace Prize." He said earlier this year he thought he deserved to win it but that the committee would not give it to him.
He had been nominated for the prize by leaders including Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, but was one of the most controversial nominees. While he says he has ended multiple wars since returning to office this year, fact-checkers dispute the claim as several conflicts he has attempted to end remain ongoing.
Experts say the Gaza ceasefire may have come too late to change the outcome of this year's award, and the committee is known to value sustained peace efforts over short-term politics.
Trump's White House communications director, Steven Cheung, reacted to Machado's win on social media, posting: "The Nobel Committee proved they place politics over peace."
"President Trump will continue making peace deals, ending wars, and saving lives. He has the heart of a humanitarian," he added.
Incidentally, the woman who did win the Nobel this year recently praised Trump after the U.S. in August announced a $50 million bounty for President Maduro's arrest.
"We're very grateful to President Trump for his decisive action towards freedom in Venezuela," Machado said in an interview on Fox News.
Trump has had Venezuela in his crosshairs since returning to office, with the U.S. military carrying out four deadly strikes on boats the U.S. claims were carrying drugs in the Caribbean. Three of those set out from Venezuela.
The Maduro government claims Trump is using the targeting of drug cartels as a pretext for regime change.
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