OF BOLIVAR AND BOSTON

One late March morning, corridos — the socially conscious ballads popular throughout Central and Latin America — blared throughout the blue and gold basement chapel of Tremont Temple Baptist Church. About 21 people mingled around a table of coffee and breakfast pastries, exchanging pleasantries in Spanish, name tags on their chests listing their names and occupations. It was a networking event for Venezuelans in the Boston region. And while ostensibly nonpolitical, it was organized and attended by outspoken critics of the current socialist government like local activist Cristina Aguilera and journalist and scholar Ana Julia Jatar. Many participants had taken part in local protests in solidarity with anti-government demonstrations in Caracas, and in one-on-one interviews most didn’t hesitate to call the Venezuelan government authoritarian, criminal, or corrupt.

One month later, in April, the recently formed Venezuelan Solidarity Committee screened Oliver Stone’s My Friend Hugo to commemorate the anniversary of the 2002 coup attempt that forced the late President Hugo Chávez out of office (and suspended the constitution) for three days. The documentary was controversial for its humanizing and favorable portrayal of the commandante, a much-maligned figure in mainstream English-language news media. While about 20 people went to the evening screening at encuentro 5 — a “space for progressive movement building in the heart of Boston” — most weren’t Venezuelans, and most Venezuelans in attendance were from the consulate.

The disparity isn’t too surprising. “The majority [of Venezuelans] here tend to support the opposition,” Jorge Marin said. Marin has lived in the US since 1974 and formed the Boston Bolivarian Council (named in honor of Chávez’s Bolivarian revolution), which ran from 2002 to 2011. The new committee, made up of 15 people, aims to resurrect his previous campaigns of education, discussions, and gathering delegations to visit Venezuela.

Marin’s political stance is somewhat rare among Venezuelan immigrants, highlighted by the fact there are so few venezolanos in the area.

Overall, Venezuelan immigrants are usually better off than most other Latin American immigrant groups, often from middle or upper-class families, well educated, and light skinned or identifying as white. According to Pew Hispanic, Venezuelans’ median earnings were higher than the general Hispanic population’s (though still lower than the overall US median). Traditionally, Venezuelans, the 13th-largest population of Latino origin, come to America either for work or education, but a turbulent political and economic climate at home has resulted in an influx of immigrants applying for asylum.

In fact, Venezuelans are now the fifth-largest group of asylum seekers.

“In the last three years, Venezuelans filed 7,000 applications,” says Aguilera’s husband, Julio Henriquez, an immigration lawyer who also handles Venezuelan asylum cases with the Refugee Freedom Program.

Part of Henriquez’s job is to educate people on asylum. The majority of Venezuelan asylum seekers may not meet the requirements, leading some to resort to illegal means to secure that status with false claims or evidence. Most Venezuelans are coming over for either political or economic reasons, Henriquez notes.

Politically, many are upset with President Nicolas Maduro’s tenure, which critics say has been strict. “This government has shown itself to be far more authoritarian than the previous one,” Henriquez says. He describes clashes between protesters and security forces, which led to many arrests, injuries, and even deaths. Crime is rampant: Caracas is now among the most violent cities in the world.

On top of that, Venezuela’s economy is in a tailspin. This is popularly attributed to a drop in oil prices (or even government mismanagement), though the Council on Hemispheric Affairs notes other factors that US outlets often ignore. Namely, it describes the elites’ stranglehold on importation, distribution, and wholesaling of all goods, and their willingness to hoard goods to combat government policies — starving the nation in the process. At the beginning of 2016, Maduro declared an economic emergency. Other factors are making the collapse worse, like a poor exchange rate (the Venezuelan Bolivar values less than a US penny) and a lack of food production. Most recently, in response to a drought, the government declared all Fridays holidays, hoping a four-day work week will lessen the use of hydroelectric power created by its dams.

About 75 percent of Venezuelan immigrants settle in Florida, says Henriquez, especially in and around Miami. In fact, the population down south is so concentrated that Weston, FL earned the nickname “Westonzuela.” It’s a different story in Boston.

“There is no Venezuelan community in Boston, in the sense that there are no towns or neighborhoods that are predominantly Venezuelan,” says Henriquez.

Most Venezuelans in Boston are students, according to Omar Sierra of the Venezuelan consulate in Back Bay. In fact, before the current financial crisis, many Venezuelan students received financial help for studying abroad. Sierra also notes that Rhode Island is home to a more working-class Venezuelan population.

Despite the increase in tension and violence, this year the elections were much more peaceful, says Sierra. “Jimmy Carter said we have the best system in the world,” he added, referring to glowing praise from the ex-president in 2012 following the Carter Center’s survey of 92 elections worldwide. (According to Associated Press, the Carter Center closed its Caracas office last May “to concentrate its limited resources in other countries that have solicited its support.”)

Venezuelans abroad often participate in solidarity protests to raise awareness of such issues. Some even start their own movements. For example, Ana Julia Jatar, chief editor of El Planeta and outspoken critic of Venezuela’s government, started the NGO Venezuelan Women in Action Against Violence. Founded two weeks before the networking event (which Jatar also attended), the NGO focuses on Venezuela’s imprisoned women and the unique abuses they suffer, including “white torture” — physical abuse that leaves no bruises, like smothering someone in a mattress and beating them.

“Some women told me it’s a generalized practice to starve them,” said Jatar. “NGOs have done a great job tracking political prisoners … [But] we believe that there has not been enough attention paid to gender issues in Venezuela. We strongly believe most of these women do not have a voice and [are] ashamed of describing out loud their treatment.” When asked whether her NGO would feature any specific focus on indigenous women, Jatar said it will and added that it will also help women from the government’s party who need it.

“Venezuelan society is a very mixed society — it’s difficult to find pure races,” she added. However, such a claim clashes with the efforts and statements of Afro-Venezuelans like congressman Modesto Ruiz, who once said “Racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia, and endo-racism are components of Venezuelan society that obey historic arguments.” However, Jatar acknowledges that “there are indigenous communities that have kept their identities that get overlooked.” Marin adds you could see the racial contrast between Chávez supporters and his opponents.

Venezuelans are also able to vote abroad. Sierra said most 2015 voting efforts were helmed by students, from registration to counting the ballots, cooperating with the embassy. Aguilera and Henriquez also founded Voto Boston, an offshoot of VotoDondeSea, to encourage people to register in the elections. It’s a non-partisan group, says Aguilera, but Marin notes they never seem to attend his events — “They know what the majority thinks,” he sighs.

Marin doesn’t dismiss the criticism of the Bolivarian government, and he understands that such frustrations come from a real place — like waiting hours in lines for food and essentials. “People are tired of shortages of food.…You can’t compare a developed country with a third world country,” he says, describing easier access to facilities and goods. “I can’t deny it’s easier.”

While every immigrant group varies, there are always familiar themes at play. Like the common expectation that one will return home at some point, their time in the US either a brief adventure or a temporary escape — an expectation that gets complicated, either as life in America improves or the situation in their home country remains unsafe or undesirable. And that’s why connections can be so valuable.

Henriquez, for example, followed Aguilera to the States when she took a job with a labor union. “I thought it would be just for a couple years — experience life in the USA and have fun.” He wound up working with labor unions for six years, attended law school here, and began practicing in Boston. Eventually, Henriquez found himself helping many Venezuelan clients with immigration issues. Soon, it clicked.

“I needed to be more connected to my community, “ Henriquez says. “Maybe I didn’t realize that,”

Marin himself came over as a kid following his parents’ separation, joining his father in America. “I never saw myself coming here. I skipped English class — I had no need for it,” he says. Marin was an undocumented immigrant for a while, but he worked, graduated from Northeastern University, and became a successful mechanical engineer with several patents.

Of course, such parallels don’t really need to be drawn for both sides to coexist. “I have friends who are in the opposition,” says Marin. “That doesn’t mean we can’t do things together. There’s a large community that’s growing — people want to stay here.”