Former Congressman David Rivera Convicted in Venezuela Lobbying Case A Miami federal jury convicted former South Florida Congressman David Rivera and consultant Esther Nuhfer on Friday for failing to register as foreign agents while lobbying U.S. politicians to advance Venezuela’s interests. The 12-person jury found the defendants guilty of conspiracy, foreign-agent violations, and money-laundering charges tied to a scheme involving a $50 million contract Rivera signed with PDV USA, the U.S. subsidiary of Venezuela’s state oil company, PDVSA. The verdict followed a five-week trial featuring 14 witnesses, including Florida Senator Marco Rubio, and thousands of documents such as text messages, emails, and financial records. Rivera, 60, and Nuhfer, 51, now face several years in prison and a potential $20 million forfeiture judgment for proceeds from Rivera’s consulting work with PDV USA. Prosecutors argued that Rivera and Nuhfer operated as agents of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro’s regime, secretly lobbying Rubio and other officials in 2017 and 2018 to normalize relations with Maduro. Prosecutor Roger Cruz accused the defendants of exploiting their connections to obscure their ties to the socialist government, stating, “His public image was as an anti-communist, but he was working for the Maduro regime the whole time.” Cruz highlighted Rivera’s text messages describing Venezuelans who fled to Miami as “savages,” which the defense claimed was political commentary, not a racist slur. The defense countered that Rivera’s contract with PDV USA, a U.S. subsidiary of PDVSA, did not require foreign-agent registration under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA), a 1938 law.#marco_rubio #former_congressman_david_rivera #esther_nuhfer #pdv_sa #pdv_usa
