Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado won the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday. She won “for her tireless work promoting democratic rights for the people of Venezuela and for her struggle to achieve a just and peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy,” the Norwegian Nobel Committee said in its citation.
The committee chose to focus on Venezuela at this time, in a year dominated by US President Donald Trump’s repeated public statements that he deserves the Nobel Peace Prize.
Ahead of the announcement, experts on the award had said Trump would not win it as he is dismantling the international world order the Nobel committee cherishes.
The Nobel Peace Prize, worth 11 million Swedish crowns, or about $1.2 million, is due to be presented in Oslo on December 10, the anniversary of the death of Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel, who founded the awards in his 1895 will.
The White House lashed out at the Norwegian Nobel Committee on Friday after it awarded the peace prize to Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado and overlooked US President Donald Trump.
“The Nobel Committee proved they place politics over peace,” White House Director of Communications Steven Cheung said on X.
“President Trump will continue making peace deals, ending wars, and saving lives. He has the heart of a humanitarian, and there will never be anyone like him who can move mountains with the sheer force of his will.”
Since returning to the White House for his second term in January, Trump had repeatedly insisted that he deserved the Nobel for his role in resolving numerous conflicts – a claim observers say is broadly exaggerated.
Trump restated his claim on the eve of the peace prize announcement, saying that his brokering of the first phase of a ceasefire in Gaza this week was the eighth war he had ended.
But he added on Thursday: “Whatever they do is fine. I know this: I didn’t do it for that, I did it because I’ve saved a lot of lives.”
Nobel Prize experts in Oslo had insisted in the run-up to Friday’s announcement that Trump had no chance, noting that his “America First” policies run counter to the ideals of the Peace Prize as laid out in Alfred Nobel’s 1895 will creating the award.
The president has not yet commented on the Nobel decision, but he did post three videos on his Truth Social account on Friday morning of supporters celebrating the Gaza deal.
“Will you get the Nobel Prize? Absolutely not. They’ll give it to some guy that didn’t do a damn thing,” Trump told top US military leaders last month.
He said it would be a “big insult” to the United States if he didn’t get it.
Nominations for the Nobel must have been made before January 31 to be valid for this year’s prize. Trump returned to the White House for his second term in office on January 20.