Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado handed her Nobel Peace Prize medal to President Trump on Thursday, a move Norwegians called "absurd" and "pathetic." "This is completely unheard of," Janne Haaland Matlary, a professor at the University of Oslo, told public broadcaster NRK. She called Machado's move "a total lack of respect for the award" and labeled the gesture "meaningless," reports Bloomberg.
- Trump, who has repeatedly complained that he deserves the peace prize and claims credit for ending multiple conflicts during his second term, accepted the medal during a White House meeting with Machado. CNN reports that she left the White House with a "Trump-branded swag bag."
- "This is, above all, absurd. The peace prize cannot be given away," said Kirsti Bergstø, the leader of Norway's Socialist Left party, per the Guardian. She added that Trump's "repeated threats toward Greenland clearly demonstrate why it would have been madness to award him the prize."
- In a post on X Thursday, the Nobel Peace Center noted that some Nobel Peace Prize medals have been passed on to others. In 2022, Dmitry Muratov auctioned off his medal for more than $100 million to help Ukrainian refugees. "But one truth remains," the center said. "As the Norwegian Nobel Committee states: 'Once a Nobel Prize is announced, it cannot be revoked, shared, or transferred to others. The decision is final and stands for all time.' A medal can change owners, but the title of a Nobel Peace Prize laureate cannot."
Machado, who has been sidelined from Venezuela's transition process since US forces ousted Nicolás Maduro on Jan. 3 but left his regime structure intact, described the gift as honoring Trump's "unique commitment with our freedom." In Norway, the gesture is being interpreted very differently, reports Bloomberg. Raymond Johansen, a former Oslo mayor from the ruling Labor Party, wrote on Facebook that the episode is "unbelievably embarrassing and damaging" to one of the world's most prominent prizes, warning that the growing politicization of the award could "easily legitimize an anti-peace prize development."
Delcy Rodriguez, the Venezuelan interim leader who has won praise from Trump, made what the New York Times sees as a "thinly veiled reference" to Machado's White House visit in remarks Thursday. "And if one day, as acting president, I have to go to Washington, I will do so with my head held high, not on my knees," she said. Jimmy Kimmel, meanwhile, offered to give Trump some of his own awards on the condition that he pulls ICE out of Minneapolis, Deadline reports. On his show Thursday night, Kimmel displayed his Daytime Emmy, Clio, Webby, and Writer's Guild of America awards and quipped: "Or, best of all, I'm willing to hand over my 2015 Soul Train award for 'white person of the year.'"
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