S. 2142 — what changed

The Central Bank of Venezuela and the Government of Venezuela have imposed a series of currency controls that has exacerbated economic problems and, according to the World Economic Forum, has become the most problematic factor for doing business in Venezuela.

Since 1999, violent crime in Venezuela has risen sharply and the Venezuelan Violence Observatory, an independent nongovernmental organization, found the national per capita murder rate to be 79 per 100,000 people in 2013.

The international nongovernmental organization Human Rights Watch recently stated, “Under the leadership of President Chàvez and now President Maduro, the accumulation of power in the executive branch and the erosion of human rights guarantees have enabled the government to intimidate, censor, and prosecute its critics.”.

The Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2013 of the Department of State maintained that in Venezuela “the government did not respect judicial independence or permit judges to act according to the law without fear of retaliation” and “the government used the judiciary to intimidate and selectively prosecute political, union, business, and civil society leaders who were critical of government policies or actions”.

The Government of Venezuela has detained foreign journalists and threatened and expelled international media outlets operating in Venezuela, and the international nongovernmental organization Freedom House declared that Venezuela’s “media climate is permeated by intimidation, sometimes including physical attacks, and strong antimedia rhetoric by the government is common”.

the United States aspires to a mutually beneficial relationship with Venezuela based on respect for human rights and the rule of law and a functional and productive relationship on issues of public security, including counternarcotics and counterterrorism;

the United States supports the people of Venezuela in their efforts to realize their full economic potential and to advance representative democracy, human rights, and the rule of law within their country;

the chronic mismanagement by the Government of Venezuela of its economy has produced conditions of economic hardship and scarcity of basic goods and foodstuffs for the people of Venezuela;

the Government of Venezuela continues to take steps to remove checks and balances on the executive, politicize the judiciary, undermine the independence of the legislature through use of executive decree powers, persecute and prosecute its political opponents, curtail freedom of the press, and limit the free expression of its citizens;

to support the people of Venezuela in their aspiration to live under conditions of peace and representative democracy as defined by the Inter-American Democratic Charter of the Organization of American States;

to work in concert with the other member states within the Organization of American States, as well as the countries of the European Union, to ensure the peaceful resolution of the current situation in Venezuela and the immediate cessation of violence against antigovernment protestors;

to continue to support the development of democratic political processes and independent civil society in Venezuela.

In general— The sanctions described in this subsection are the following:

Asset blocking— The exercise of all powers granted to the President by the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (50 U.S.C. 1701 et seq.) to the extent necessary to block and prohibit all transactions in all property and interests in property of a person determined by the President to be subject to subsection (a) if such property and interests in property are in the United States, come within the United States, or are or come within the possession or control of a United States person.

Exclusion from the United States and revocation of visa or other documentation— In the case of an alien determined by the President to be subject to subsection (a), denial of a visa to, and exclusion from the United States of, the alien, and revocation in accordance with section 221(i) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1201(i)), of any visa or other documentation of the alien.

Penalties— A person that violates, attempts to violate, conspires to violate, or causes a violation of paragraph (1)(A) or any regulation, license, or order issued to carry out paragraph (1)(A) shall be subject to the penalties set forth in subsections (b) and (c) of section 206 of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (50 U.S.C. 1705) to the same extent as a person that commits an unlawful act described in subsection (a) of that section.

Waiver— The President may waive the application of sanctions under subsection (b) with respect to a person if the President—

on or before the date on which the waiver takes effect, submits to the Committee on Foreign Relations and the Committee on Banking Housing, and Urban Affairs of the Senate and the Committee on Foreign Affairs and the Committee on Financial Services of the House of Representatives a notice of and justification for the waiver.

Regulatory authority— The President shall issue such regulations, licenses, and orders as are necessary to carry out this section.