President Donald Trump said it was “very nice” of Venezuela opposition leader María Corina Machado to present him with her Nobel Peace Prize.
Machado was at the White House on Thursday for lunch with Trump as his administration considers how best to deal with Venezuela after he ordered the capture of former Venezuelan dictator Nicholas Maduro earlier this month.
“Well, she offered it to me,” Trump said Friday. “I thought it was very nice. She said, ‘You know, you’ve ended eight wars, and nobody deserves this prize more than — in history — than you do.’ And I thought it was a very nice gesture. And by the way, I think she’s a very fine woman, and we’ll be talking again.”
Trump, who has publicly campaigned for the prize, has cast doubt on Machado’s ability to lead Venezuela in Maduro’s absence, indicating his preference for Maduro’s former vice president, acting President Delcy Rodríguez, with whom he also spoke on Thursday.
When asked why he prefers Rodríguez to remain Venezuela’s president, despite support for Machado, Trump cited Iraq, saying, “Everybody was fired, every single person, the police, the generals, everybody was fired, and they ended up being ISIS.”
“Instead of just getting down to business, they ended up being ISIS,” he said. “So I remember that. But I’ll tell you, I had a great meeting yesterday by a person who I have a lot of respect for, and she has respect, obviously, for me and our country, and she gave me her Nobel Prize. But I’ll tell you what— I got to know her. I never met her before, and I was very, very impressed. She’s a really — this is a fine woman.”
The White House on Thursday shared an image of Trump meeting with Machado, with Machado telling reporters on Capitol Hill she did so in “recognition for his unique commitment with our freedom.”
President Donald J. Trump meets with María Corina Machado of Venezuela in the Oval Office, during which she presented the President with her Nobel Peace Prize in recognition and honor.
pic.twitter.com/v7pYHjVNVO
— The White House (@WhiteHouse) January 16, 2026
As he departed the White House for a long weekend at Mar-a-Lago, his private resort in Palm Beach, Florida, on Friday, Trump also dismissed reports that Israel and Arab state leaders implored him not to strike Iran amid unprecedented protests across that country and the Iranian regime’s crackdown on them.
“Nobody convinced me. I convinced myself. You had yesterday scheduled over 800 hangings. They didn’t hang anyone. They canceled the hangings. That had a big impact,” he said.
During the brief, informal press conference, Trump downplayed speculation that he stoked that he would invoke the Insurrection Act to end anti-immigration enforcement demonstrations in Minneapolis after an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer fatally shot protester Renee Good this month.
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“It’s been used a lot, and if I needed it, I’d use it. I don’t think there’s any reason right now to use it, but if I needed it, I’d use it. It’s very powerful,” he said.
Trump wrote in a Truth Social post this week that, “If the corrupt politicians of Minnesota don’t obey the law and stop the professional agitators and insurrectionists from attacking the Patriots of I.C.E., who are only trying to do their job, I will institute the INSURRECTION ACT, which many Presidents have done before me, and quickly put an end to the travesty that is taking place in that once great State.”