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By JOSHUA GOODMAN, Associated Press Writer
MIAMI (AP) — A retired Venezuelan army general says U.S. officials at the highest levels of the CIA and other federal agencies were aware of his efforts to oust Nicolás Maduro — a role he says should immediately debunk criminal charges that he worked alongside the socialist leader to flood the U.S. with cocaine.
The stunning accusation came in a court filing late Friday by attorneys for Cliver Alcalá seeking to have thrown out narcoterrorist charges filed nearly two years ago by federal prosecutors in Manhattan.
“Efforts to overthrow the Maduro regime have been well known to the United States government,” Alcalá’s attorneys said in a November 2021 letter to prosecutors that accompanied their motion to have the charges dismissed.. “His opposition to the regime and his alleged efforts to overthrow it were reported to the highest levels of the Central Intelligence Agency, National Security Council, and the Department of the Treasury.”
The court records raise fresh questions about what the Trump administration knew about the failed plot to oust Maduro involving Jordan Goudreau, an idealistic if battle-scarred former U.S. Green Beret, and a ragtag army of Venezuelan military deserters he was helping Alcalá train at secret camps in Colombia around the time of his arrest.
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Alcalá has been an outspoken critic of Maduro almost since he took office in 2013 following the death of Hugo Chávez.
But despite such open hostility toward Maduro, he and his sworn enemy were charged together in a second superseding indictment with being part of a cabal of senior Venezuelan officials and military officers that worked with Colombian rebels to allegedly send 250 metric tons of cocaine a year to the U.S. .
While the attorneys provided no details about what U.S. government may have known about Alcalá’s coup plotting, they said they believe his activities “were communicated at the highest levels of a number of U.S. government agencies” including the CIA, Treasury and Justice departments, the NSC and the Drug Enforcement Administration.
To that end they are seeking documents and information, much of it classified, regarding communications between U.S. officials and members of Venezuela’s opposition regarding Alcalá. Those U.S. officials include former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, former Attorney General William Barr as well as senior officials at the White House and unnamed CIA operatives in Colombia.
The CIA didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment sent Friday night.
Also named as having knowledge of Alcalá’s activities are two allies of opposition leader Juan Guaidó — who the U.S. recognizes as Venezuela’s legitimate leader — as well as Miami-based political strategist J.J. Rendon, who signed on behalf of Guaidó a never-executed agreement for Goudreau to carry out a snatch and grab operation against Maduro.
“The evidence is clear that he has been openly and actively opposed to his alleged co-conspirators for at least the past eight years,” attorneys wrote in the letter to prosecutors included in Friday’s filing. “Indeed, his conduct, in support of the democratic ideals in which he believes, constituted treason against the very people whom the government alleges were his co-conspirators for which they seek his detention, imprisonment, and life.”
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