Eva Golinger

Eva Winifred Golinger (born 19 February 1973) is a Venezuelan-American lawyer, writer and journalist. She practices law in New York and specializes in immigration and international law. She is the author of several books about the late Hugo Chávez, of whom she was an outspoken supporter,[1] and his relationship with the US. Chávez called her La novia de Venezuela ("The Girlfriend of Venezuela"),[2] and she served as a foreign policy advisor to his government.[3] The National Catholic Reporter wrote that Golinger headed the "pro-Chávez" Venezuela Solidarity Committee in 2004.[4] Her website, venezuelafoia.info, aimed to shed light on what she called links between US government agencies and Venezuelan organizations by publishing documents obtained using the US Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).[5]

Eva Golinger
Born (1973-02-19) 19 February 1973
Hampton, Virginia, United States
Alma materSarah Lawrence College, City University of New York School of Law
Spouse(s)Gustavo Moncada (divorced)

As of July 2017, Golinger works as a host on RT's Spanish language television network.[6] She previously edited the Correo del Orinoco International, a newspaper financed by the Venezuelan government,[7][8] and wrote for the pro-Bolivarian Revolution website Venezuelanalysis.com.[9]

Early life and education

Golinger was born on 19 February 1973[10] in Langley Airforce Base, Virginia to Ronald Golinger, a US Air Force psychiatrist, and Elizabeth Calderon, a Venezuelan attorney.[11][12][13] At a young age, Golinger was introduced to progressive causes, with her mother Elizabeth bringing her to marches for women's rights.[13] She graduated in 1994 from Sarah Lawrence College with a liberal arts degree.[14][15]

Venezuela

After college, Golinger moved to the city of Mérida in Venezuela to explore her roots and learn more of her great-grandfather who was killed under the rule of Juan Vicente Gomez.[13][10] While residing in Mérida, Golinger experienced a struggling Venezuela. Chávez was still in jail for the 1992 Venezuelan coup d'état attempts and students were protesting against government austerity; she taught English, sang in a band, and described Venezuela as "an adventure", saying she "fell in love with the country".[13] In 1998, Golinger returned to New York with the band's guitarist as her husband[13] and completed her Juris Doctorate (JD) in international human rights law in 2003 at City University of New York School of Law.[14] She then began to develop an interest in what she said was the role of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in regime change around the world.[15]

Chávez and Venezuela activism

Following the 2002 Venezuelan coup d'état attempt, Golinger grew concerned about the United States' knowledge that a coup was possible and gave information to pro-Chávez organizations with research taking much of her time.[13] In early 2004, going into the 2004 Venezuela recall elections, Golinger found what she said was evidence that the US was funding opposition groups.[13] She traveled to Venezuela to show Chávez her work and became a naturalized Venezuelan citizen shortly thereafter.[11][13] She wrote that the US was opposed to Chávez because it wanted oil and because he was "an ideological challenger".[13]

Golinger meeting with President Nicolás Maduro during a ceremony of the Presidential Honor Guard, SEBIN and DGCIM

For a time, Golinger edited the Correo del Orinoco International, a web- and print-based newspaper which was financed by the Venezuelan government.[7][16] She was also a writer for Venezuelanalysis.com.[9][17] A 2011 profile in The New York Times described her as "one of the most prominent fixtures of Venezuela's expanding state propaganda complex", and Correo del Orinoco was described as "Venezuela's equivalent of the Cuban newspaper Granma".[11] "I'm a soldier for this revolution," she said.[11]

The New York Times described Golinger's website, Venezuelafoia.info as "pro-Chavez" and noted in 2004 that she uncovered " ... documents [that] form part of an offensive by pro-Chávez activists who aim to show that the United States has, at least tacitly, supported the opposition's unconstitutional efforts to remove the president. Golinger ... obtained reams of documents from the National Endowment for Democracy, a nonprofit agency financed by the United States government, that show that $2.2 million was spent from 2000 to 2003 to train or finance anti-Chávez parties and organizations."[5] According to The New York Times, "The documents do not show that the United States backed the coup, as Mr. Chávez has charged. Instead, the documents show that American officials issued 'repeated warnings that the United States will not support any extraconstitutional moves to oust Chávez.'"[5] However, the documents also showed that American officials knew a coup attempt was brewing.[5]

Relationship with Chávez

Golinger was close to the Chávez administration, and accompanied Chavez on diplomatic missions to Iran, Libya, and Syria. She traveled extensively with President Chávez on foreign trips, including a seven-country tour in 2010. She dined with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and gave him a copy of her book describing him as "gentle" at their meeting. "Chávez presented me as his defender to Ahmadinejad", she told The New York Times.[11]

In a 2016 interview Golinger said:

The loss of Hugo Chavez has been crushing. He was my friend and I spent nearly ten years as his advisor. The void he has left is impossible to replace. Despite his human flaws, he had a huge heart and genuinely dedicated himself to build a better country for his people, and a better world for humanity. He cared deeply about all people, but especially the poor, neglected and marginalized.[18]

In the film Revolution in Ruins: The Hugo Chavez Story, Golinger described a private interview with Chavez in which she asked a question which "set him off". Chavez said "I am the president, I do not have to explain my actions". Chávez turned off the tape and said : "My neck is sore. Do you give massages?" Golinger said she found the experience "very uncomfortable and unpleasant", although nothing happened beyond that.[19][20][21]

Post-Chávez

From 2015, Golinger was listed as a staff writer for TeleSUR.

Rory Carroll wrote in The Guardian that Golinger said there was "circumstantial evidence" of US involvement in the death of Chávez from cancer—a claim the US State Department said was "absurd".[22][23]

Following the 2017 Venezuelan constitutional crisis, where the Supreme Court of Venezuela took over the democratically elected National Assembly, BBC Monitoring Americas wrote that Golinger, "one of the staunchest defenders internationally of left-wing Chavist rule in Venezuela", agreed that the takeover was "a rupture of the constitutional order".[24]

Books

Golinger is the author of several books on Chavez's relationship with the United States, based on research using the U.S. Freedom of Information Act on what she describes as links between US government agencies and Venezuelan organizations, particularly in relation to the 2002 Venezuelan coup d'état attempt. Her books are published in multiple languages by different publishers in over eight countries and were both celebrated and launched at events that often included the participation of high level Venezuelan government officials.[25][26][27]

The Chávez Code

Her first book, The Chávez Code (2006), was initially presented in Havana at the Havana International Book Fair in Santiago de Cuba; its preface was co-authored by Rogelio Polanco, Cuban Ambassador to Venezuela.[28][29] It has been published in eight languages, and was optioned for a feature film.[15] This book was introduced by the Venezuelan Vice President Jose Vicente Rangel.[25] A review by Choice recommended the book but cautioned readers that it was "not written by a scholar" and described the book as "almost painfully one-sided and full of knee-jerk liberal outrage". Choice said it "lays bare yet another counterproductive attempt to intervene where many believe the US has no moral or legal right to do so".[30]

A Veneconomy review stated that they found dozens of instances of what they considered sloppy work, manipulation of sources, false and chronologically inaccurate claims, and amateur historiography.[31]

La Agresión Permanente

In 2009 Golinger co-authored with Jean-Guy Allard the book La Agresión Permanente ("The Permanent Aggression"), published by the Venezuelan-based publisher Perro y La Rana and the Venezuelan Ministry of Information.[14][32]

Publications

See also

References
  1. Romero, Simon, (26 October 2009). "Michael Moore Irks Supporters of Chávez". The New York Times
  2. Golinger, Eva (10 January 2010). Eva Golinger Describes Curacao as the Third Frontier of the United States. Salem-News.com. Retrieved 22 February 2010
  3. "Venezuela vs. The Empire: A Night with Eva Golinger in Los Angeles". Archived from the original on 27 April 2011.
  4. Jones, Bart (2 April 2004). "U.S. funds aid Chavez opposition: National Endowment for Democracy at center of dispute in Venezuela". National Catholic Reporter. Retrieved 21 February 2010.
  5. Forero, Juan (3 December 2004). "Documents Show C.I.A. Knew of a Coup Plot in Venezuela". The New York Times. Retrieved 21 February 2010.
  6. Gupta, Girish (29 July 2017). "U.S. 'sweetheart' of Venezuela sees worrying signs of authoritarianism". Reuters. Retrieved 26 April 2018.
  7. Carroll, Rory (7 March 2010). "Why being a satirist is no joke in Hugo Chávez's Venezuela". Guardian online. Retrieved 10 March 2010.
  8. "AN aprueba crédito para aumentar tiraje del Correo del Orinoco" (in Spanish). Correo del Orinoco. 3 February 2010. Retrieved 11 July 2011.
  9. Bogardus, Keven (22 September 2004). Venezuela Head Polishes Image With Oil Dollars: President Hugo Chavez takes his case to America's streets. Archived 4 October 2011 at the Wayback Machine Center for Public Integrity. Retrieved 22 February 2010.
  10. "Eva Golinger: "Escribir me rescata de la soledad"" (in Spanish). Government of Venezuela. 2014. Archived from the original on 4 January 2015.
  11. Romero, Simon (4 February 2011). "In Venezuela, an American Has the President's Ear". Retrieved 4 January 2015.
  12. International Organization for a Participatory Society. "Eva Golinger Profile on the International Organization for a Participatory Society".
  13. Rory, Carroll (2014). Comandante : Hugo Chavez's Venezuela. Penguin Books: New York. pp. 196–99. ISBN 978-0143124887.
  14. (in Spanish) Allard, Jean-Guy and Eva Golinger (2009), La Agresión Permanente: USAID, NED y CIA (PDF), Caracas: Ministerio del Poder Poder Popular para la Comunicación y la Información, p5
  15. Golinger, Eva (18 November 2008). My new book is out! The Empire's web: encyclopedia of interventionism and subversion. Postcards from the Revolution. Retrieved 22 February 2010.
  16. Carroll, Rory (9 March 2010). "Chavez in driver's seat as he silences his critics". The New Zealand Herald.
    * "AN aprueba crédito para aumentar tiraje del Correo del Orinoco" (in Spanish). Correo del Orinoco. 3 February 2010. Retrieved 11 July 2011.
  17. "About venezuelanalysis.com". Venezuelanalysis.com. Archived from the original on 26 February 2010.
  18. Whitney, Mike (22 April 2016). "The Strange Death of Hugo Chavez: an Interview with Eva Golinger". CounterPunch.org. Retrieved 2 February 2021.
  19. Ramaswamy, Chitra (16 January 2019). "Revolution in Ruins: The Hugo Chávez Story review – essential, chilling viewing". the Guardian. Retrieved 2 February 2021.
  20. "¡Le salió cuaima! Marisabel le reclama a Eva Golinger el "parampampán" con Hugo". La Patilla (in Spanish). 24 January 2019. Retrieved 24 January 2019.
  21. "Eva Golinger relató la "situación incómoda" que tuvo con Hugo Chávez". El Nacional (in Spanish). 20 January 2019. Retrieved 24 January 2019.
  22. Carroll, Rory (8 March 2013). "International: Allies blame CIA". The Guardian. London: Proquest. p. 26.
  23. Dewey, Caitlin (5 March 2013). "Maduro promises to investigate Chavez 'assassination'". The Washington Post. Retrieved 25 April 2018.
  24. "Defender of Chavism Eva Golinger faults Supreme Court move". BBC Monitoring Americas. London: Proquest. 31 March 2017.
  25. "Bautizado libro "El Código Chávez"". Archived from the original on 16 July 2011.
  26. "Bautizado el libro "USAID, NED y CIA. La agresión permanente"". Archived from the original on 20 December 2009.
  27. "MInCI bautizará el libro "La agresión permanente" en la Filven 2009". Archived from the original on 22 February 2012.
  28. "C U B a P O L I D a T A · Rogelio Polanco". Archived from the original on 27 July 2011.
  29. "Cuba - Contra la guerra y el terrorismo mediático. Noticias, debate, opinion". Archivo.cubadebate.cu. Archived from the original on 28 July 2013. Retrieved 29 October 2012.
  30. Duff, E. A. (March 2007). "The Chávez code: cracking US intervention in Venezuela". Choice: Current Reviews for Academic Libraries. 44 (7): 1239–1240.
  31. "Articulos" (PDF) (in Spanish). Veneconomy.com. Archived from the original (PDF) on 19 March 2013. Retrieved 29 October 2012.
  32. (in Spanish) Presentado libro "La agresión permanente" de Eva Golinger y Jean-Guy Allard en Feria del Libro de Venezuela. Archived 5 March 2012 at the Wayback Machine Agencia Bolivariana de Noticias (ABN), 21 November 2009. Retrieved 23 February 2010.
  33. Dinneen, Mark (2009). "Bush Versus Chávez: Washington's War on Venezuela - by Golinger, Eva". Bulletin of Latin American Research. 28 (2): 287–288. doi:10.1111/j.1470-9856.2008.0298_3.x.
  34. Browse by Authors. "Bush Vs. Chavez: Washington's War on Venezuela". aakarbooks.com. Archived from the original on 24 March 2012. Retrieved 29 October 2012.
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