US raises flag over embassy in Venezuela after 7-year hiatus

The US flag has been raised above its embassy in Venezuela for the first time in seven years, following the US capture of authoritarian leader Nicolas Maduro and the restoration of diplomatic relations.

“A new era has begun. We’re staying with Venezuela,” the US Charge d’Affaires Laura Dogu, the embassy’s most senior diplomat, writes in a post on X with a photo of the Stars and Stripes being raised outside the embassy.

En la mañana del 14 de marzo de 2019, la bandera estadounidense fue arriada por última vez en la Embajada de los Estados Unidos en Caracas. Esta mañana, 14 de marzo de 2026, a la misma hora, mi equipo y yo izamos la bandera de los Estados Unidos—exactamente siete años después de… pic.twitter.com/kTrwnnECdb

— Embajada de los EE.UU., Venezuela (@usembassyve) March 14, 2026

Dogu writes that she and her team raised the flag “exactly seven years after it was removed” on March 14, 2019, two months after Caracas severed ties over Washington’s refusal to recognize Maduro’s flawed re-election in 2018.