Juan Guaido (born 28 July 1983) was the interim President of Venezuela from 23 January 2019, succeeding Nicolas Maduro. A member of the social democratic Popular Will party and the former President of the National Assembly, he swore himself in as interim President in January 2019, as he did not recognize the results of the rigged election which re-elected Maduro as President.
Biography[]
Juan Gerardo Guaido Marquez was born in La Guaira, Venezuela in 1983, and he was raised in a middle-class family. After a natural disaster devastated Vargas state in December 1999, his family was left homeless, and Guaido was angered by Hugo Chavez's ineffective response to the tragedy. He took part in a student-led political movement which protested Chavez's reforms during the 2000s, and, in 2009, he and Leopoldo Lopez co-founded the Popular Will opposition party. Guaido was elected as a Popular Will deputy in 2015, and he became leader of the opposition in 2018 and President of the National Assembly on 5 January 2019. Guaido described Maduro's 10 January 2019 inauguration as illegitimate, and, the following day, the National Assembly declared that Guaido had assumed the powers of President in opposition to Maduro. On 23 January 2019, Guaido swore himself in as interim President, challenging incumbent Maduro, who remained in office. That same day, he urged the military to rise up against Maduro, and the United States, Brazil, Canada, Chile, and Colombia were quick to recognize Guaido as the legitimate President.