A federal jury in Miami convicted former U.S. Representative David Rivera, a longtime friend of Secretary of State Marco Rubio, on Friday for secretly working as an unregistered foreign agent for the Venezuelan government. Rivera and his associate, political consultant Esther Nuhfer, were found guilty on all charges, including failing to register with the Justice Department under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) and conspiracy to commit money laundering. The verdict capped a seven-week trial that laid bare a hidden $50 million influence campaign aimed at reshaping Washington’s stance toward the Maduro regime during the first Trump administration.
“These convictions expose a simple truth: the defendants sold access and influence to a hostile foreign regime for money,” said U.S. Attorney Jason A. Reding Quiñones. “In South Florida, where so many families fled communist oppression, that kind of betrayal carries real weight.”
Rivera, 60, looked stone-faced as the jury delivered its verdict. Judge Melissa Damian ordered him taken into custody pending sentencing, citing flight risk given his access to funds, the potential prison term, and additional federal charges he faces in Washington, D.C.
The trial drew testimony from some of the most senior Republican figures in the country. Marco Rubio, now Secretary of State, and Texas Congressman Pete Sessions both testified that they were unaware of Rivera’s consulting contract with PDV USA, an affiliate of Venezuela’s state oil company, when they interacted with him. Prosecutors said Rivera used the contract as cover to lobby senior Trump administration officials, including Rubio and Sessions, to abandon the hard-line sanctions campaign against Maduro.
Prosecutor Roger Cruz told jurors that Rivera and Nuhfer “manipulated influential friends” like “pawns on a chess board” and hid their work because it would have ended Rivera’s political career as an anti-communist stalwart. “As long as the money kept coming in, they didn’t care from where,” Cruz said in closing arguments.
To conceal the lobbying, prosecutors said, Rivera set up an encrypted chat group called MIA with Venezuelan media tycoon Raúl Gorrín, who was later charged in the U.S. with bribing top Venezuelan officials. In the chats, Maduro was code-named “the bus driver,” Sessions “Sombrero,” then-Foreign Minister Delcy Rodríguez “The Lady in Red,” and millions of dollars “melons.” Payments from Caracas were referred to repeatedly as “the light.”
Defense attorneys argued that the contract was commercial work focused on luring ExxonMobil back to Venezuela — activity they said is generally exempt from FARA — and that Rivera’s meetings with Rubio and Sessions came after the contract expired and were aimed at removing Maduro. “He was working every possible angle to get Nicolás Maduro out,” defense attorney Ed Shohat said. Nuhfer’s attorney, David Oscar Markus, likened the government’s case to the Salem witch trials, insisting, “My client does not have a dark heart.”
Prosecutors countered that the Exxon work was a sham. They said Rivera and Nuhfer set up meetings for Rodríguez in New York, Caracas, Washington, and Dallas, and used Sessions to try to broker a meeting with ExxonMobil’s CEO. Sessions also agreed to deliver a letter from Maduro to Trump after a secret meeting in Caracas. The outreach collapsed, however, when the Trump administration soon adopted a “maximum pressure” campaign against Maduro, labeling him a dictator.
Rivera, who served one term in Congress from 2011 to 2013, had previously shared a Tallahassee home with Rubio during their time in the Florida legislature. He has faced past controversies, including allegations that he secretly funded a Democratic spoiler candidate, though federal charges in that matter were dropped. The defense said it plans to appeal Friday’s conviction.