Venezuela's president Nicolas Maduro
Venezuela's president Nicolas Maduro Photo by JUAN BARRETO/AFP via Getty Images

Hezbollah's presence in Latin America has expanded significantly under the protection of Venezuela's authoritarian government, according to former U.S. Treasury official Marshall Billingslea.

Billingslea, who served as Assistant Secretary for Terrorist Financing, said before the Senate Caucus on International Narcotics Control that the Nicolás Maduro regime has transformed Venezuela into a "willing safe haven" for the Lebanese militant group, providing access to forged documents, unlawful financing, and drug trafficking routes that link the Middle East to the Western Hemisphere.

Billingslea said the regime has issued thousands of passports to individuals with suspected ties to Hezbollah and Hamas, enabling operatives to travel freely across the region and, in some cases, enter the United States.

According to documentation presented at the hearing, more than 10,000 Venezuelan passports were issued between 2010 and 2019 to citizens from Syria, Lebanon, and Iran. Billingslea said many of these documents were granted under the supervision of former Venezuelan Vice President Tareck El Aissami, who has long been accused of facilitating Hezbollah-linked activities.

The former Treasury official also claimed that Venezuela allowed Hezbollah to establish a paramilitary training center on Margarita Island and awarded contracts to front companies connected to the group as early as 2001. He warned that this collaboration has intensified since Maduro took power.

Billingslea cited reports suggesting that roughly 400 Hezbollah commanders have been deployed from Lebanon to South America—primarily Venezuela—since early 2025, as the group seeks to protect its operations amid growing instability in the Middle East.

"With the deterioration of the group's infrastructure in Lebanon and mounting economic pressure on Iran, Latin America has become an increasingly vital source of financing for Hezbollah," Billingslea said. He urged the United States and regional partners to increase coordination to disrupt what he called Venezuela's transformation into a "terrorist and criminal operations hub" in the Western Hemisphere.

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