News Summaries in August 2026

 Note to readers: newly prepared summaries of older stories may sometimes be placed at the top to call attention to them, at least for a time. They also will be placed in chronological order.

“Venezuelan Dynasty Balks at Oil Deal,” Wall Street Journal, August 22-23, 2026

A relatively small California oil producer backed by European investors is now positioned to grab some of the first assets made available by Venezuela in a new era for its oil industry, said Kejal Vyas and Collin Eaton of the Wall Street Journal. The small producer, Pacific Coast Energy, has moved more quickly than major companies such as ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips, which are eyeing the market warily two decades after Venezuela nationalized their assets.  But Pacific Coast Energy has run into a complication: “Venezuela’s prominent Cisneros family asserts rightful ownership of some of the same oil fields that Pacific Coast is negotiating to operate,” the Journal reporters write. The family said the interim government secretly and illegally nullified the rights the Cisneroses had in a joint venture called PetroDelta. The dispute highlights the challenges of doing business eight months after the Trump administration took control of the energy industry in Venezuela and encouraged American investors to take a new look at it, the Journal said. “With extended family who dominate Venezuelan industries from beer to television broadcasting, the Cisneroses have long been the country’s most prominent business dynasty. They are part of a regime-friendly elite that successfully navigated years of authoritarian rule.” Juan Domingo Alonso, a lawyer for the Cisneros family, said Venezuelan authorities never liquidated the joint venture and so can’t transfer its oil fields to a new partner. 

“Deportees Who Resisted Arrival in Liberia Are Taken to Equatorial Guinea,” New York Times, August 24, 2026

At least five people deported  under a new agreement in which Liberia said it would accept 1,200 deportees from the United States resisted getting off the plane when flown there last week and subsequently were taken to Equatorial Guinea also in Africa, said a U.S. official and lawyers familiar with the removal.  Dozens of migrants sent to Equatorial Guinea since November have been sent onward to the countries from which they originally fled despite U.S. court protections to prevent that, said the non-profit group Human Rights First. Among the migrants deported August 20 to Liberia were four Cuban men, a Brazilian and a woman from Cameroon, said Alexander Smolyar, a lawyer for Asian Americans Advancing Justice Atlanta.  The five who resisted were among 20 deportees, said Pranav Baskar, Hamed Aleaziz and Genevieve Glatsky of the New York Times. Three of those who resisted were from Cuba. They told the Times it was “a terrifying ordeal.” Officers placed knees on their necks when they resisted disembarking, they said. They were removed from the plane and  eventually put back on it and told they would be returned to the United States but landed in Equatorial Guinea instead. They said they were met there by dozens of masked officers carrying semiautomatic guns and then taken in a van in handcuffs to a remote hotel in the capital, Malabo. “The men said that now they were worried because they knew that other deportees had remained in Equatorial Guinea for months and they did not know how the government there would handle their immigration status,” the Times said. Human Rights First and Refugees International said the Trump administration has made deportation deals with more than 35 countries, many of them in Africa. The agreement with Liberia is one of the largest so far negotiated by the Trump administration. The agreements pertain to third-country deportations in which people are removed from the United States but not initially sent to their home countries, usually because a judge has ruled that they would face torture or persecution there. 

“Colombian President Orders Immigration Raids, Vows Deportation of Migrants Without Legal Status,” Associated Press, August 24, 2026

The new president of Colombia says he will deport thousands of migrants in the country without residence permits, most of them Venezuelans. Abelardo de la Espriella says the changes to immigration policy will reduce crime. In office three weeks now, de la Espriella said he’ll order the immigration service to carry out raids with Colombian police as early as this week, reported Manuel Rueda and Astrid Suárez of the Associated Press. A close ally of President Trump, the ultraconservative leader said police will first target immigrants who are committing crimes followed by those without regular status. “I will not accept any illegal immigrants, wherever they come from,” he said in a video released August 23 on his X social media account. “They will have to leave and be deported. It is a political decision I am taking responsibility for.” Most migrants come from Venezuela, which lost about one-fifth of its population during the past ten years as they fled repression and poverty, including a 75 percent contraction in the country’s Gross Domestic Product. The United Nations estimated that about 2.8 million Venezuelans are living in Colombia. The country’s immigration service said in July it had granted temporary residence permits to about 2.3 million Venezuelans under a 2021 program started at the peak of the immigration crisis in Venezuela. Colombia stopped issuing temporary residence permits about three years ago, said Ana Carina Garcia of Juntos Se Puede, which assists Venezuelan migrants in Colombia.  She said the administration should expand the ways in which people can become legal residents rather than going after those without residency permits. “We understand that the president wants to protect Colombians,” she said. “But there is no need to protect them from migrants. It has been proven that foreigners do not commit crimes at greater rates” than Colombians, she said.  Venezuelans are still trying to get into Colombia. Arles Pereda, head of an organization that represents Venezuelans in Bogota, expressed concern about those seeking opportunities in Colombia after being displaced by the devastating earthquakes in Venezuela in June. Pereda said “the doors seems to be closing. Not just in Colombia, but also in Chile, Peru and Ecuador.” Conservative leader in those countries also have made it harder for Venezuelans to get residency permits. 

 

“US Strikes a Vessel in the Eastern Pacific, Killing 2 People in First Attack in Months,” Associated Press, August 24, 2026

The United States military Aug. 23 killed two people it accused of trafficking drugs on a “low-profile” vessel in the eastern Pacific, the first such boat attack in more than two months. “As with most of the military’s statements, Southern Command did not provide evidence that the vessel was ferrying drugs,” reported Konstantin Toropin and Bill Barrow of the Associated Press. The U.S. has killed 223 people in 67 strikes during a nearly yearlong campaign of bombing alleged drug boats in Latin America. Gen. Francis Donovan, head of the military’s Southern Command, said “we are committed to imposing total systemic friction on narco-terrorists – disrupting their operations, dismantling their leadership, and eliminating cartel terror across the region,” he said. The Trump administration is pursuing agreements to carry out its attacks on land as well. Colombia, Guatemala, and Honduras have agreed to allow the U.S. to carry out joint military operations on their soil, said U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth during a visit to Panama this month. However, Guatemala denied reaching such an agreement. “Ecuador launched similar missions with the U.S. in March,” the AP reporters noted. They said critics have questioned the legality and effectiveness of the strikes [The New York Times has reported a number of times that experts say the attacks are illegal].

“In Step With Ally to the North, Latin America Unifies Its Right,” New York Times, August 24, 2026

The ascendancy of right-wing leaders in Latin America reflects voter frustration with soaring crime and insecurity and the perceived failure of left-wing leaders to deal effectively with economic and immigration issues, say Emma Bubola, Annie Correal and Ana Ionova of the New York Times. It’s nothing new in Latin America for like-minded leaders on the right or the left to band together, as in the case of the long alliance between Venezuela and Cuba. “But this new crop of conservative leaders – many of them political newcomers – is promoting a new, brazen, often social-media powered version of this dynamic,” they write. Previously veiled political preferences of individual leaders have now become explicit. At the center of this new dynamic is the Trump administration, forging connections through its Shield of the Americas initiative against drug traffickers and organized crime , and its activist role in the internal politics of individual countries. Allying with the Trump administration can yield financial bailouts and a fast tracking of military or disaster aid. Yet right-wing leaders risk a domestic backlash from Trump military tactics that run up against national sovereignty and from verbal aggression that undermines economic interests. Right-wing candidates that recently won in Colombia, Peru, Bolivia and Chile voiced a common message, vowing to take on rising violent crime and spur economic recovery. “They also adopted strident ideological language,” the Times reporters note. For example Colombia’s new president, Abelardo De La Espriella, promised to “disembowel” the left. Argentina’s president, Javier Milei, said he wants to defeat “the cancer of socialism.” Milei recently made an appearance in Brazil, dancing and beating his chest in support of right-wing presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro. He called the current president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, “socialist trash” and “a thief.” That created a breach with Brazil, which recalled its ambassador to Argentina. Brazil is Argentina’s main trading partner. A trading breach could make it harder for Argentina to repay the billions it owes the International Monetary Fund, said Monica de Bolle of the Peterson Institute for International Economics. Milei also has withdrawn negotiators from a U.N. climate summit and taken Argentina,  recently hit by a hantavirus outbreak, out of the World Health Organization. He visited Spain six times without meeting with its leftist leader Pedro Sánchez and criticized the wife of Sánchez. “There is just zero upside for Argentina in picking fights with all these leaders,” said Benjamin Gedan of the Stimson Center in Washington, D.C. Support for right-wing leaders could weaken if they give in to pressure from Trump to allow military operations in their countries. The Times reporters noted that this month U.S. Defense Secretary  Pete Hegseth “announced that the new president [of Columbia] would allow joint military operations, prompting an uproar across Colombia’s political spectrum, especially that such a major step could be announced by an American.” 

“A Region Shaped by Hardship Is ‘Left in Ruins,’” New York Times, August 21, 2026

Already one of Colombia’s most vulnerable areas, the Pacific region of Chocó was the epicenter of the 7.4 magnitude earthquake that killed at least 298 people last week across the country. “We were left in ruins,” 35-year-old Juan Taborda told Genevieve Glatsky of the New York Times. In Quibdó, the capital of Chocó, most of the buildings were  destroyed or damaged.  During much of the history of Colombia, Chocó was a remote region where enslaved Africans were brought by Spaniards to work in the mines. “Some escaped and formed communities beyond colonial control,” wrote Glatsky. It’s a region far less developed than the rest of Colombia in infrastructure and public services. Chocó’s governor, Nubia Carolina Córdoba, said “the dimension of the tragedy in Chocó lies in how many living people today have nothing. In how many months of suffering, pain, hunger and homelessness await those who survived.” Colombia’s new president, Abelardo De La Espriella, visited the region twice in his first week in office. “I want to propose a special plan – a Marshall Plan – for Chocó,” he said without offering details.  Shakira, Colombia’s global superstar, visited the region with the son of billionaire Warren Buffett, Howard Buffett, and raised money to help students and rebuild schools. But for many, there is little to fall back on, noted Glatsky. “There are no major businesses here,” said Luis Fernando Palacio, the priest in the town of La Ye in Chocó. “We live here relying on God’s mercy and generosity.” 

 

“Judge Orders New Oversight of Immigrant Children’s Detention,” New York Times, Aug. 18, 2026

A federal judge has found that immigration detention centers in Texas and California likely housed children and other detainees at unsafe temperatures and denied them soap and adequate sleeping conditions. Judge Dolly M. Gee of the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles issued an order August 17 appointing an independent monitor and a special master—an expert assigned to assist her --  to track government compliance with a 1997 legal agreement setting basic standards of care for immigrant children in U.S. custody. Plaintiffs have asked the court to step in because they said evidence is growing that the government is not complying with the agreement, known as the Flores settlement. The settlement says that migrants 17 years old and younger must be expeditiously released from custody and receive adequate meals, clean water, clothing, education and medical assistance. Among the complaints by families and their children were that holding cells were kept at temperatures so low that they were referred to as “hieleras” – iceboxes in Spanish. They said in San Diego lights were kept on day and night. Children are supposed to be transferred out of facilities within 72 hours and out of ICE custody within 20 days. But at the family detention center in Dilley, Texas, lawyers for plaintiffs claimed that about 1,560 minors had been detained longer than 20 days, based on six months of data. The judge found that there “stark” and “conflicting” differences between the compliance claims by the government and reports by detainees, said Times reporter Jazmine Ulloa. A court filing said a 10-year-old child with a heart murmur had to wait almost 60 days before seeing a cardiologist. Another said a two-year-old with diarrhea was sent to a hospital only after six days with fever. Families said children often could only get Tylenol or ibuprofen for various medical conditions. The court said the government may have kept faulty records masking how long children were held. The Trump administration has gone to court to try to end the Flores settlement. It said that it is compliance with the settlement and that standards for appointing independent monitors hadn’t been met. 

“Family Presses for Answers on ICE Shooting in Maine,” New York Times, August 20, 2026

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security said it would investigate the shooting death July 13 in Biddleford, Maine, of a Colombian immigrant by a federal immigration agent. The man’s partner, Karolina Rojas, has been interviewed by state investigators but hasn’t been contacted by any of the federal agencies involved, said a lawyer representing the family of the 25-year-old man who was killed, Johan Sebastián Durán Guererro. “Any reasonable investigation would include interviewing the family and eyewitnesses,” said the lawyer, Ben Gideon. Maia Spoto and Murray Carpenter of the New York Times said that “the D.H.S. and the Department of Justice declined to answer direct questions about whether the killing was being investigated. The Justice Department referred the question to the D.H.S., which said that its inspector general would investigate the discharge of the agent’s firearm but said nothing about investigating Mr. Durán Guererro’s death.” Durán Guererro had a pending asylum application and a valid work permit and no removal order, said Rep. Chellie Pingree, a Democratic U.S. House member from Maine who organized a forum to highlight unanswered questions about the killing.  The federal agent who shot Durán Guererro has a history of violent behavior, family members told the AP (See summary, “AP Exclusive: ICE Officer in Maine Shooting Has History of Violent Behavior, Family and Records Say,” July 16, 2026). The D.H.S. said he opened fire while “fearing for public safety.” Immigration agents have shot at more than 20 people during the Trump immigration crackdown, many in vehicles and some fatally, the Times reporters said. 

“U.S. Quietly Deporting Mexican Migrants to Guatemala and Honduras, Angering Mexico,” CBS News, August 18, 2026

Even though the Mexican government is willing to accept the return of all of its citizens the Trump administration is quietly deporting Mexican migrants to other countries in Central America. It is flying them around Mexico to take them to Guatemala and Honduras, two Department of Homeland Security officials said anonymously. The idea is to deter illegal immigration from Mexico by sending some of its citizens farther away from the U.S.-Mexico border. Camilo Montoya-Galvez of CBS News reported that “the deportations have been occurring for months and have sent hundreds of Mexican citizens to Honduras and Guatemala, one of the DHS officials said.” Mexico’s foreign ministry said it “rejects the deportation of Mexican nationals to third countries and has no such agreement in place.” It added that Mexico “consistently takes the steps necessary to ensure the safe and dignified return of all its nationals to national territory.” A DHS spokesman said the administration “is utilizing all lawful options.” Previous administrations have deported Mexicans deep into Mexico, but experts said sending them to other countries was unprecedented. Adam Isacson of the Washington Office on Latin America said the tactic is also one of deterrence in addition to making it harder for those deported to get back to the U.S. The idea is to “broadcast the hardship, to make sure people know that this is a possible consequence of remaining undocumented in the United States and to encourage people to self-deport.” He said “this is almost entirely punitive.” 

“Ex-Mexican President’s Son Loses U.S. Visa,” Wall Street Journal, Aug. 15-16, 2026

The Trump administration has revoked the U.S. visa of the son of Mexico’s former president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, the founder of the left-leaning ruling party Morena and the mentor of the current president, Claudia Sheinbaum. The son, Andrés Manuel López Beltran, posted an open letter on social media August 13 blaming U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and his deputy Christoper Landau, who refers to himself as “El Quitavisas,” or the visa revoker. Wall Street Journal reporter José de Cordoba said López Beltrán called the move a “Hitlerian” action and said President Trump should fire the two officials. Sheinbaum said August 14 that the revocation was “an attempt to interfere in Mexican politics.” López Beltran said he hadn’t committed any immoral or criminal action justifying the action. A State Department spokesperson said “every visa decision is a national security decision.” Sheinbaum said the move was the latest against Mexico’s sovereignty after the U.S. indictment of various current and former Mexican officials including the governor of the state of Sinaloa, Ruben Rocha. They were indicted on charges of accepting bribes to protect the operations of the Sinaloa cartel, charges Rocha denies. The son, known as Andy, held a key position in the Morena party and is preparing to run for Mexico’s national assembly next year. He has denied reports in the Mexican press linking him to various corruption schemes. Last month the head of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, Terry Cole, said the Mexican government and the country’s cartels are “one and the same,” reported de Córdoba. Cole said the Rocha indictments were “just the beginning of what is to come in Mexico.” Sheinbaum said she didn’t believe the letter from López Beltrán, which he later deleted, would harm Mexico’s relationship with the U.S. “We always have to work for a good relationship,” she said. “The best way to do things is to not become small.” 

“A Useful Diplomatic Tool for Trump: Lifting Visas,” New York Times, August 17, 2026

The Trump administration has deployed an array of tactics to tighten its grip on Latin America. They include tariffs, economic sanctions, attacks on dozens of boats in the Caribbean and Pacific, involvement in foreign elections, and capturing the president of a country. Now, in unprecedented fashion, it is using another: lifting visas, according to Emiliano Rodríguez Mega, Emma Bubola, Gabriel Labrador, and David Bolaños of the New York Times. For example, it used the tactic in Chile to shut down a Chinese project connecting the South American country to Hong Kong via a 12,000-mile underseas cable. Thrilled at signing the agreement, Chilean officials were told later that day in January by a U.S. embassy official that the U.S. would issue a travel ban not only for the officials involved but also for their spouses and children. The cable could increase the risks of Chinese cyberattacks, the U.S. official said. Chile put the project on hold. The Trump administration also has revoked the visas of foreign leaders, ambassadors and other officials, and judges and journalists (see summary above). The U.S. “stripped a Brazilian Supreme Court justice of his visa for prosecuting former President Jair Bolsonaro, a Trump ally.” Visa revocation “can undermine a person’s political authority and sever personal or professional ties to the United States,” the story said. Visa revocations are being used to suppress criticism of the Trump administration and even of foreign leaders allied with Trump. Two politicians in Panama criticized a security pact between their country and the United States. They were notified by the Trump administration that their visas had been revoked. “While the United States has a long history of covert interventions and heavy-handed meddling in Latin America, former diplomats say the Trump administration’s methods represent a stark break,” the Times reporters noted. “No recent American administration ever did this kind of open attack on freedom of expression” in a foreign country, said John Feeley, a former U.S. ambassador to Panama. 

“Covert CIA Program Said to Be Behind Mysterious Attacks on Galapagos Boats,” Washington Post, August 13, 2026

Mysterious attacks against multiple Ecuadorian fishing boats near the Galapagos Islands this year were part of a CIA covert operation, according to a report by Washington Post correspondents Imogen Piper, Ellen Nakashima, Samantha Schmidt, Samuel Oakford, Warren P. Strobel, Alex Horton and Aaron Schaffer. In the attacks, a fishing vessel and eight of its crew members disappeared in January. No evidence has emerged that the crew members of the targeted boats were involved in drug trafficking and survivors said they were merely fishing. “The strikes are separate from the Pentagon’s campaign against alleged drug boats that began last fall,” the Post reporters said. “Those strikes have been fiercely criticized by human rights groups and some Democratic lawmakers, who say they are extrajudicial murders.” Those strikes have killed 221 people since September. “It is unclear why, as the Trump administration touts its military attacks against alleged drug boats, it would engage in a separate clandestine effort targeting vessels, said former U.S. officials who previously worked in the region.” In each of the clandestine attacks, a business jet with specialized surveillance technology flew from El Salvador toward the fishing vessels on the days of the strikes and on the days before that. The CIA has surged new resources and personnel to Latin American as it gained new authorities to counter narcotics trafficking. 

“The Far Right is Distorting Ceuta,” Anne Applebaum, The Atlantic, August 2, 2026

Although it was unclear who created viral posts that led tens of thousands of Moroccans to think they could flee their country and reach mainland Europe, forces that wanted to boost the European far right wasted no time in posting photographs of the Moroccans making a break for Europe by way of the North African Spanish enclave of Ceuta. “The photographs and videos that emerged from Ceuta…on July 29 and 30 looked very much like migrant-terror videos, deliberately designed to be broadcast by the international far right,” wrote Anne Applebaum. “So closely did this incident resemble the ‘invasion’ that MAGA and its European friends have long said is underway that it was not hard to suspect that it had been orchestrated,” she said. Media outlets reported that many Moroccans saw a TikTok video claiming “the Spanish border is open and you can cross without papers” to reach the European continent. Vice President JD Vance posted a link to a “wildly dishonest Fox News segment" that incorrectly said the  migrants were arriving in Northern Spain rather than in North Africa, Applebaum said. Vance said “Thank God” Donald Trump was elected and “our country’s border no longer looks like this.” British far right party member Robert Jenrick said “Ceuta is our future if we don’t secure our border.” Alice Weidel, a far right party member in Germany, said “Germany is the likely destination.” But “these were lies,” said Applebaum, because access to Ceuta does not give anyone access to the rest of Europe. Whatever one might think of Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez or his government, he did not open Spain’s borders to the wave of Moroccans, instead calling it an “attack on Spain’s territorial integrity,” she said. 

 

“Spain Rushes to Secure Territory’s Border,” Wall Street Journal, August 1-2, 2026

After streaming into the Spanish enclave of Cueta in North Africa July 30 and early July 31, most of the estimated 50,000 to 60,000 people from neighboring Morocco had voluntarily returned to their home country by the evening of the 31^st, Spain’s interior ministry said. “At least 57 people died during the rush into the territory, mostly by drowning as crowds of people tried to swim around breakwaters that divide Cueta from Moroccan territory,” the Wall Street Journal said in a story reported by David Luhnow, Margherita Stancati, and Andrea Figueras. The onrush of so many people stirred fear and anger in Cueta, where 84,000 people live in an area about six times the size of New York City’s Central Park. That so many then left did little to reduce that fear and anger; it “left several thousands of immigrants still roaming the streets,” with many residents staying indoors and shops shut for fear of looting. A weeping Ceuta resident, Rocio Gil, told Spanish television “she was frightened to be in a city overrun with foreign young men. Visibly shaken and surrounded by a crowd of young Moroccans, she said: ‘As a woman, you have to live this to understand what it’s like. It’s an invasion…and there is no law.” The Journal reporters said analysts suggested the incident appeared to be orchestrated by the Moroccan government and was more about regional politics and tensions involving Spain, Morocco and Algeria and less about immigration. Anxiety about the incident spread to other countries in Europe. “The scenes of thousands of mostly young men pouring across the border went viral across Europe and elsewhere, and raised fears the immigrants would use the enclave as a springboard to Europe.” Apart from the issue of whether government manipulation was involved, a New York Times story (see next summary) described migrants despairing over their economic futures as the driving force behind their willingness to risk drowning to reach Cueta -- and many did not make it. 

 

“Do You Think if I Had a Job I Would Have Gone?”,  New York Times, August 3, 2026

There are two stories to tell about Morocco, say Ben Hubbard and Aida Alami of the New York Times. One the one hand, there is King Mohammed VI speaking to his nation July 29 talking about a growing economy making big strides in tourism, investment and manufacturing. There are the preparations to co-host the 2030 World Cup, and a strong relationship with President Trump. On the other hand, on July 30 and July 31, “tens of thousands of his citizens tried to escape the country [see summary above]. Driven by a bleak sense of their prospects in Morocco, they braved confrontations with the police and dangerous swims in the sea to reach the Spanish territory of Cueta, hoping for better lives.” By August 1, many of the 50,000 to 60,000 migrants who had forced their way into Cueta had left because of an absence of food and water and the expulsion of some by Spanish security forces. Spanish authorities said 72 people died, many from drowning. Morocco reported 11 deaths. Asked where she had worked before she set out for Cueta, 22-year-old Ahlam al-Adnan snapped “do you think if I had a job I would have gone?” She said she had swum to Cueta with four siblings, including an 8-year-old brother. They hid there in a forest but she said she got detained when she went looking for food and then was sent back to Morocco. “I tried to work and have a job and make a living, but there is nothing for me here,” said a 21-year-old construction worker, Mohammed Kinani, who also had been forced back to Morocco. “If I don’t leave this country, there is nothing that will save me.” Morocco has made big investments in a port and a high-speed train and on stadiums for the World Cup. But the spending does not create lasting jobs, said Najib Akesbi, an economist at the Institute of Agronomy in Rabat. Many investments create construction work that disappears when projects are complete. “They are not concerned by the needs of the population, and the youth in particular,” he said.