Government funding compromise includes Rubio-backed Venezuelan aid bill

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https://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/article238428848.html

A newly negotiated government funding compromise on Capitol Hill includes nearly a half-billion dollars in humanitarian aid to support Venezuelan refugees and codifies sanctions against the regime of embattled Venezuelan ruler Nicolás Maduro.

Released Monday ahead of a looming U.S. government shutdown, the $1.4 trillion bipartisan appropriations package includes legislation introduced by Democratic New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez and a group of more than a dozen U.S. Senators, including Florida Republican Marco Rubio, to help restore democracy in Venezuela and address what the United Nations has called one of the largest mass migrations in the western hemisphere.

That bill, called the Venezuela Emergency Relief, Democracy Assistance, and Development Act of 2019 — or VERDAD — increases humanitarian assistance to the poverty-torn South American nation and formally recognizes opposition leader Juan Guaidó as the country’s president. It also attempts to speed up reconstruction in the country by targeting private assets stolen by the government and requiring President Donald Trump to engage the International Monetary Fund to pull the country out of hyperinflation.

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