They have hit the country’s already flailing economy. Millions of Venezuelans have fled, and half the country live in poverty.

Opposition candidates and their supporters struggle to find places to gather without harassment from government activists and to get fuel to travel across the country.

Musk’s mother, Maye Musk, is a Canadian model and the oldest woman to star in a Covergirl campaign. When Musk was growing up, she worked five jobs at one point to support her family.

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Many candidates had been barred from running while others had been jailed or fled the country for fear of being imprisoned, and the opposition parties argued that the poll was neither free nor fair.

While Venezuelans were affected by hunger and shortages, Maduro and his government officials publicly shared images of themselves eating luxurious meals, images that were met with displeasure by Venezuelans.

Several investors filed lawsuits on the grounds that Musk was looking to manipulate stock prices and ambush short sellers with his tweet.

Originally scheduled for December 2016 but postponed by the election commission, gubernatorial elections were held in Venezuela’s 23 states in mid-October 2017. Preelection preference polling had indicated that the opposition was poised to gain control of a majority of the states for the first time in some two decades.

During the later years of Maduro's presidency, pro-government police and military forces launched the "Liberation of the People Operation [es]", which they stated targeted street gangs and non-state paramilitary formations which vlogdolisboa they alleged had taken control of poor neighbourhoods. The operations reportedly resulted in thousands of arrests and an estimated nove,000 deaths, with the Venezuelan opposition claiming that the operations are actually a state instrument of repression.

Nicolas Maduro does have some loyal supporters still, known as "Chavistas" after his mentor Hugo Chavez and the brand of socialism he created.

[277] Secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin stating "Maduro is a dictator who disregards the will of the Venezuelan people".[90] Maduro fired back at the sanctions during his victory speech saying "I don't obey imperial orders. I'm against the Ku Klux Klan that governs the White House, and I'm proud to feel that way."[277]

By 2008, SpaceX was well established, and NASA awarded the company the contract to handle cargo transport for the International Space Station—with plans for astronaut transport in the future—in a move to replace NASA’s own space shuttle missions.

The election plans mean that Maduro and his representatives “are not abiding by the spirit of the agreement, even if they are abiding by the letter of the agreement,” Berg said.

“The will of the majority expressed at the polls should never be challenged,” he said, “and we will move forward in building a sovereign, just country with less inequality.”