Posts Distort Democrats’ Positions on Venezuela, China, Iran

Quick Take

Social media posts make a broad and misleading claim that “Democrats stood with” the leaders of Venezuela, China and Iran rather than supporting oppressed people in those countries. The facts don’t support that generalization.

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Dubious viral posts on Facebook accuse Democrats of supporting repressive regimes around the world and argue that President Donald Trump, on the other hand, has “stood with” the people of those countries.

The claim, first spread by a pro-Trump Twitter user, feeds into and expands upon the erroneous narrative spread in recent weeks that Democrats have “mourned” the death of Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani, who was killed in a U.S. airstrike on Jan. 2.

“Trump stood with the people of Venezuela. Democrats stood with Maduro. Trump stood with the protesters in Hong Kong. Democrats stood with Communist China. Trump stands with the people of Iran. Democrats stand with Soleimani and the Ayatollahs,” the posts read. “Notice the pattern yet?”

But that broad assertion doesn’t hold up after a review of public statements and legislative actions by Democrats on the national stage. We’ll go through each component of the claim here.

Venezuela and Maduro

Early last year, Trump said the U.S. would officially recognize Venezuela’s National Assembly president, Juan Guaidó, as the country’s interim president — rather than Venezuela’s president since 2013, Nicolás Maduro, whose 2018 re-election was widely considered illegitimate by other countries, including the U.S. Venezuela has endured a collapsing economy and human rights groups have said medicine and food shortages constitute a “humanitarian emergency.”

Efforts by opposition forces, with U.S. support, to oust Maduro in 2019 were ultimately unsuccessful.

But it’s baseless to say that “Democrats” — which implies most, if not all — “stood with Maduro.”

Democratic leaders in Congress — including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer — issued statements supporting the recognition of Guaidó as interim president and rebuking Maduro.

“The United States must respect legitimate democratic processes, and support the right of the people of Venezuela to protest and defend their human rights,” Pelosi said. “Nicolas Maduro’s regime of repression and impoverishment for his personal enrichment continues to gravely violate human rights, and must be condemned swiftly by the full international community.”

A handful of Democrats in Congress did express opposition to a U.S.-forced regime change in Venezuela, and instead endorsed peace negotiations facilitated by other countries and the Vatican. But even one of those lawmakers, Rep. Ilhan Omar, wrote that “No one is defending Maduro.” She later said, “Opposition to intervention ≠ support for a country’s leader.”

In February, Democrats in Florida criticized presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders for not explicitly calling Maduro a dictator and recognizing Guaidó. But when the Council on Foreign Relations surveyed 18 Democrats running for president last year on the issue of Venezuela, including Sanders, none offered statements of support for Maduro.

Instead, almost all explicitly condemned Maduro, supported Guaidó, or did both.

Former Vice President Joe Biden called Maduro “a tyrant, who has stolen elections, abused his authority, allowed his cronies to enrich themselves, and denied the delivery of food and medicine to the people he claims to lead.” Sen. Elizabeth Warren said Maduro is “a dictator and a crook who has wrecked his country’s economy, dismantled its democratic institutions, and profited while his people suffer.”

Many of the candidates called for the U.S. to assist Venezuelans, who were fleeing the country by the millions. And some of the candidates expressed reluctance for the U.S. to become entangled in regime change.

The few who were less explicit in their criticism of Maduro largely cautioned the U.S. to not become involved militarily, or engage in tactics that could potentially be harmful to Venezuelans.

Sanders, for example, said his “administration would support the negotiations between the Maduro government and the opposition, and work with other countries in our region, and the international community, to support the Venezuelan people’s right to build their own future.” He said he “would condemn the use of violence against unarmed protesters and the suppression of dissent” and “listen to the voices of Venezuelan activists themselves who warn against broad sanctions, such as the Trump administration’s oil sanctions, that mainly punish the people, not the government.”

Sanders has more recently referred to Maduro as a “vicious tyrant.”

Hong Kong Protests

Demonstrators have taken to the streets in Hong Kong since the of summer 2019 to protest against a (now-scrapped) proposed bill that would have allowed extraditions from Hong Kong to China. Pro-democracy protesters also demanded changes to Hong Kong’s election process, including the direct election of the city’s chief executive, who is selected by a 1,200-member committee.

During the December Democratic presidential debate, former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg, who has repeatedly expressed support for the protests, accused Trump of not making “a peep” in support of “folks out there standing up for democracy” in Hong Kong.

As we wrote at the time, Buttigieg’s claim about Trump wasn’t accurate; the president had signed two bills supporting Hong Kong protesters despite objections by the Chinese government.

However, those two bills got to the president’s desk with the help of most congressional Democrats.

The first bill — S. 1838, the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act of 2019 — requires the U.S. to annually “assess whether political developments in Hong Kong justify changing Hong Kong’s unique treatment under U.S. law,” including not being subject to tariffs levied upon China. It also features some human rights provisions.

That bill was sponsored by Republican Sen. Marco Rubio and passed by unanimous consent in the Republican-controlled Senate. It was then approved by the Democrat-controlled House. While a few representatives from both parties did not vote, the only member of the House who voted against it was Rep. Thomas Massie — a Republican.

The second bill, S. 2710, was sponsored by Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley and prohibits the sale of “specified munitions,” including tear gas, rubber bullets and handcuffs, to the Hong Kong Police Force. The bill was approved in both chambers and there were no votes against it.

Pelosi and a bipartisan group of lawmakers also hosted pro-democracy activists from Hong Kong at the U.S. Capitol in September.

And in addition to Buttigieg, other Democratic presidential candidates still in the race — such as Biden, Warren, Sanders and Sen. Amy Klobuchar — have publicly supported the protesters, too.

Iran and Soleimani

After the Jan. 2 killing of Soleimani, many leading Democrats criticized or questioned Trump’s decision to order the airstrike on the Iranian military leader. Pelosi referred to the move as “provocative and disproportionate.”

But as we’ve written, the House speaker didn’t “defend” Soleimani, as the president claimed. And, as PolitiFact found, it’s also not the case that top Democrats were “mourning” his death.

Instead, many have acknowledged his acts of terror — the Pentagon has attributed the deaths of hundreds of American and coalition service members to Soleimani, and said he was planning future attacks — even when criticizing or questioning Trump’s decision to have him killed.

For example, while Schumer said the Trump administration’s “lack of advance of consultation and transparency with Congress can lead to hasty and ill-considered decisions,” he also said Soleimani was a “notorious terrorist” and that “no one should shed a tear over his death.”

Days after Soleimani was killed, Iran shot down a Ukrainian passenger airplane, killing 176 people. After Iran initially denied responsibility, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani then blamed human error and said the plane was accidentally shot down — a revelation that prompted Iranians to take to the streets to protest the Iranian government.

Trump publicly supported those protesters, warning Iran in a tweet that “the World is watching.”

While some prominent Democrats — including 2020 candidates Biden, Warren and Klobuchar — posted messages supporting the protesters, some journalists and conservative media personalities highlighted an apparent reluctance by Democrats to be as vocally supportive of the Iranian protesters as Trump. A Washington Post columnist, urging Democrats to be more supportive even if criticizing Trump’s policies, opined that their hesitancy stemmed from distrust of Trump and the possibility that “his confrontational policies” that “could drag us into another Middle Eastern conflict.”

Pelosi, for her part, was asked if she supported the protesters on ABC News on Jan. 12. She first acknowledged that previous protests have occurred — both against the regime and against the U.S. — and said that the Iranian government should be “held accountable” for allowing commercial flights to take place at that time.

Pelosi then added: “Of course we would love to see the aspirations of the people of Iran realized with a better situation there,” before warning against the U.S. “escalating the situation — unless we’ve exhausted every other remedy.”

Her response was hardly a defense of Soleimani or Iran’s leaders.

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy has criticized House Democrats for not allowing a vote on a resolution he sponsored that condemned Iran and supported protesters. But that was a procedural vote — not one on the substance of the resolution — after Republicans had attempted to amend an unrelated bill to require immediate consideration of McCarthy’s resolution. (Democratic Rep. Mark DeSaulnier countered that the maneuver was one to “hand over control of the House floor to the minority.” He said “Congress supports” the people of Iran “who have stood up to their government demanding transparency and fighting for their rights.”)

Pelosi’s spokesman, Drew Hammill, also told FactCheck.org in an email that Pelosi supports a resolution introduced in December by Democratic Rep. Ted Deutch that expresses support for protesters in Iran and condemns the country for “a long history of violent repression of dissent,” noting arrests and murders of protesters.

“Congress, on a bipartisan and bicameral basis, firmly supports the Iranian people in their struggle to have their freedoms and human rights respected by the Iranian regime and condemns Tehran’s unprecedented, outrageous use of lethal force against the protestors,” Hammill said. “The Speaker is proud to support H. Res 752, Chairman Ted Deutch’s bipartisan resolution supporting the Iranian people’s legitimate protests against the oppressive Iranian government. Congress wants to see the aspirations of the people of Iran realized, and will continue to urge the Administration to use diplomacy and America’s economic might — not senseless military escalation — to bring accountability, freedom and peace to Iran. The violence must end now.”

We couldn’t find instances of Democrats making statements “stand[ing] with Soleimani and the Ayatollahs,” as the social media posts argue. While cautioning against a war with Iran, Pelosi said during a press briefing on Jan. 9 that “we have no illusions about Iran, no illusions about Soleimani, who was a terrible person.”

Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here.