A network of leftist groups rapidly coordinated to protest President Donald Trump’s extradition of dictator Nicolas Maduro from Venezuela in the early hours of Saturday morning, according to a new report.
The same network continued its coordinated protests as Maduro appeared in court Monday, pleading not guilty to federal drug trafficking charges.
“The U.S. has no political or legal authority to kidnap a foreign head of state,” Manolo De Los Santos, founder of The People’s Forum and a key leader in the network, posted on X Monday.
Asra Nomani, a researcher who focuses on leftist movements, described the network in an analysis for Fox News Digital Saturday.
A coalition of openly socialist and communist groups responded to news of Maduro’s ouster in real time, Nomani noted, mobilizing protests in an estimated 100 cities by Saturday.
The same Marxist groups behind the pro-Maduro protests have also spearheaded leftist activism in the U.S. for years, she noted, including responses to the killing of George Floyd in 2020 and the Hamas attack on Israel in 2023.
“For years, this cell has fomented anti-American hate in the U.S. under the cover of ‘anti-war’ protests, rallying activists after the 9/11 attacks to condemn the U.S. response, appropriating ‘anti-racism’ protests after the 2020 killing of George Floyd, marching with Antifa agitators, organizing antisemitic campus encampments after the Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel by Hamas and activating ‘working-class Americans to support Maduro and his regime in a war against ‘U.S. imperialism,” she writes.
According to Nomani, the network includes De Los Santos and The People’s Forum, as well as the ANSWER Coalition, a nonprofit co-founded by openly Marxist Brian Becker.
It also includes socialist news outlets BreakThrough News and the People’s Dispatch, the political Party for Socialism and Liberation, and the International People’s Assembly, which links communist parties and socialist movements worldwide.
The protest group Code Pink, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit founded by Jodie Evans, is also part of the coalition. Evans is the wife of U.S.-born former tech executive Neville Roy Singham, who chairs the Marxist think tank Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research. The think tank’s director Vijay Prashad is also a member of the network.
The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform is investigating Singham over his alleged ties to the Chinese Communist Party.
Prashad, meanwhile, posted a photo of himself with De Los Santos and Maduro in November 2021 touting elections in Venezuela.
Nomani recounts how the network activated in the hours after news of the Venezuela strike broke.
The Network Activates
The coalition of groups activated immediately after reports of U.S. strikes in Venezuela. “From a military intelligence perspective, experts say the overnight sequence bears the hallmarks of a pre-positioned influence network executing a rapid-response operation,” Nomani reported.
“The synchronization of messaging, the staggered release of content across aligned platforms and the immediate transition from online agitation to physical mobilization point to an ecosystem designed not for spontaneous protest, but for ideological warfare.”
BreakThrough News reported on the strikes, characterizing them as “an illegal bombing campaign.”
Ten minutes later, De Los Santos posted on X, condemning the strike as “illegal” and a “war crime.”
The ANSWER Coalition chimed in less than an hour later, calling for protests.
The People’s Forum shared the call to action minutes later.
The Party for Socialism and Liberation also rushed to share the poster for Saturday’s protests.
Prashad posted, “Down with U.S. imperialism.”
Code Pink joined the condemnations at around 6 a.m.
Maduro’s Court Appearance
The same groups organized protests outside the New York City detention center where Maduro was held Monday.
The People’s Forum urged activists to flock to Foley Square, outside the federal courthouse where Maduro appeared for his arraignment on Monday, tagging Code Pink and the ANSWER Coalition in the social media post.
The forum later posted footage of the protest.
The Party for Socialism & Liberation, which printed posters for the event, also posted pictures on X.
Nomani cited experts in describing the network’s actions as a “new threat matrix.”
“Experts say the network that spent decades legitimizing and defending communist regimes abroad and now functions as a rapid-response influence force inside the United States is a new threat matrix that amounts to something the FBI and intelligence agencies investigate as malign foreign influence,” she wrote.
