WASHINGTON — After Venezuelan opposition figure María Corina Machado suggested the idea of presenting her recent accolade to President Donald Trump, the organization in charge of the Nobel Peace Prize issued a statement clarifying the rules surrounding the award.

“Once a Nobel Prize is conferred, it remains permanent, non-revocable, and cannot be transferred or shared,” said the Norwegian Nobel Institute in a statement released on Friday. “This decision is definitive and everlasting.”

This clarification followed Machado’s remarks about wishing to share the prize with Trump, who played a key role in a U.S.-led operation that apprehended Venezuela’s authoritarian leader Nicolás Maduro. Maduro is currently facing drug trafficking charges in New York.

“I would love to personally let him know that the Venezuelan people, for whom this prize stands, definitely want to offer it to him and share it with him,” Machado stated during an interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity on Monday. “What he has accomplished is historic. It represents a significant move towards a democratic transition.”

The Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded Machado the Nobel Peace Prize in October 2025 for promoting democratic rights and her struggle for a transition to democracy. 

Machado dedicated the prize to Trump, along with the people of Venezuela, shortly after it was announced. Trump has coveted and has openly campaigned for winning the Nobel Prize himself since his return to office.

María Corina Machado is a Venezuelan opposition leader and democracy activist who has been a central figure in efforts to challenge Venezuela’s socialist-led government for more than two decades. 

Machado, an industrial engineer and daughter of a steel magnate, began challenging the ruling party in 2004, when the nongovernmental organization she co-founded, Súmate, promoted a referendum to recall then President Hugo Chávez. The initiative failed, and Machado and other Súmate executives were charged with conspiracy.

She drew the anger of Chávez and his allies the following year for her Oval Office meeting with then U.S. President George W. Bush. Chávez considered Bush an adversary.

Her full transformation into a politician came in 2010 when she was elected to a seat in the National Assembly, receiving more votes than any aspiring lawmaker ever. It was from this position that she boldly interrupted Chávez as he addressed the legislature and called his expropriation of businesses theft.

“An eagle does not hunt a fly,” he responded. The exchange is seared in voters’ memories.

She ran in an opposition primary in 2012, and later launched another presidential push in 2023, ultimately winning the opposition’s primary in a landslide. But a ban from holding public office prevented her from running against Maduro in the 2024 election, and her allies instead backed Edmundo González, a former diplomat. 

González crushed Maduro by a more than a two-to-one margin, according to voting machine records collected by the opposition and validated by international observers. Still, Venezuela’s National Electoral Council, loyal to the ruling party, declared Maduro the winner of the July 28, 2024, contest.

People protested the results across the country, and the government responded with full force, arresting more than 2,000 people and accusing them of plotting to oust Maduro and sow chaos. 

Machado went into hiding and later made a brief public appearance during protests ahead of Maduro’s January inauguration. She was briefly detained after joining supporters in the protest, and went into hiding Jan. 9, 2025. 

In October 2025, the Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded Machado the Nobel Peace Prize for promoting democratic rights and her struggle for a transition to democracy. 

The Associated Press contributed to this report.