Recognized by U.S. as Venezuela’s President-Elect, Edmundo González Meets With Biden

He is widely believed to have won Venezuela’s presidential election, and by a landslide. But on Monday, instead of making preparations for his swearing-in at the palm-lined palace in Caracas, Edmundo González was at the White House meeting with President Biden.

The encounter, a first for the two men, signals Mr. Biden’s desire to present a broad coalition of support for Mr. González, who met with the right-wing president of Argentina, Javier Milei, over the weekend, and will meet with other regional presidents in the coming days.

It is part of an effort by Mr. Biden, in the final days of his administration, to further isolate Nicolás Maduro, Venezuela’s longtime autocratic leader, who claims he won the country’s July election.

“We had a long, fruitful and cordial conversation with President Biden and his team,” Mr. González said at a news conference outside the White House, but he did not provide any details about the topics they discussed.

The Biden administration did not comment immediately.

Pedro Mario Burelli, a veteran Venezuelan political operative and an opponent of Mr. Maduro’s movement, called the visit part of an effort to “freak him out” — to scare Mr. Maduro into believing that the global political tide is increasingly turning against him.

Yet the meeting is unlikely to change the narrative inside Venezuela: Mr. González, 75, was forced to flee the country shortly after millions of Venezuelans voted for him, and he is now living in exile in Spain. Over the weekend, he promised once again that he would return to his country to be sworn in on Friday.