Kathy Valera was fast asleep when a call from her mother woke her up in the middle of the night on Jan. 3. The U.S. had captured former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores de Maduro, following U.S. military strikes in Caracas.
"My mom woke me up at 2:00am, like, 'look this is happening in Venezuela now.' My father called me from Venezuela. All my friends called me from there," said Valera, who runs the Venezuelan restaurant White Maize in Carroll Gardens. "Everyone is happy about it."
Ricardo Hernandez Anzola, a film professor at Brooklyn College, said he was visiting family for New Year's in Venezuela when the U.S. captured Maduro. He was asleep during the strikes and did not know about them until several hours later.
"As many Venezuelans, I've come to try to adapt and carry with plans I can with an ever present uncertainty," said Anzola, who was initially hesitant about traveling because of the risk of a military intervention. "My immediate reaction was nervousness and an urge to know more about what was really happening."
In federal court, Maduro pleaded not guilty for narco-terrorism, cocaine importation conspiracy and weapons counts. He is currently being held at the Metropolitan Detention Center, a federal jail in Sunset Park.
"I was happy," said Kensington resident Hermann Mejia, who co-owns the Sunset Park coffee shop Liebre Cafe. "It feels good inside. Maduro has been a cruel dictator. What Venezuela went through, it was terrible. I could talk for a week to allow you to understand."
Father Ernesto Alonso, the coordinator of the Venezuelan Ministry for the Diocese of Brooklyn, said based on his work with the Venezuelan community, change has been warranted for a long time.
"They were living without freedom," he said. "They want a democratic country. Eight million left to find work. If you said an opinion, you would go to prison. The economy was getting worse and there was no food."
Despite the excitement, some believe not enough has happened. Members of Maduro's regime still run Venezuela, including Vice President Delcy Rodríguez, who is now the interim president.
"We're still having bad people at the government," Valera said. "Maduro is only one. We need other figures in power right now to be captured."
The Trump administration said it will oversee the transition of the nation, although details on exactly how are not yet available.
Mejia said he does not fully trust President Donald Trump, but compares his actions to someone throwing a rope to a drowning person. He wants to see sanctions taken away so Venezuela can have a better economy.
Valera is relieved that the U.S. captured Maduro because it showed people like him are "not untouchable." As for the allegations that Trump's motives were over oil, she is not too concerned, explaining that after 27 years of dictatorship, Venezuela is prime for a reset. She also wants to see opposition leader, María Corina Machado, be the next president.
"She has a lot of strength and courage," Valera said. "She also has been the one who actually has consistently showed up, spoken up, and stood her ground."
Meanwhile, there is speculation that the Trump administration is looking at Cuba for another regime change. Father Alonso, a Cuban native, supports this because he says Cubans are living in worse conditions than Venezuelans.
"There's no power, no medicine, education is collapsing," he said. "There's no freedom of speech and religion. It'd be a new dawn for Cuba."
For now, Brooklyn's Venezuelans are taking one day at a time.
"It has been a roller coaster of often contradictory emotions," said Anzola. "My ultimate hope is that Venezuela can be governed by people who can be voted in and voted out by Venezuelan citizens in a fair election, something we haven't experienced in a long time."
