By Wilfredo Miranda Aburto in DIVERGENTES
February 11, 2026
The Trump administration has recalibrated its pressure on Nicaragua and personalizes their criticisms of Murillo, who Washington identifies as the real power of the regime in the face of a “living dead Ortega”. Declarations of the State Department and Congress punctuate the twist. The pressure extends to the legislative and financial planes, and the effects of the new US tone are being felt in Managua.
Shortly after the capture of Nicolás Maduro in Caracas, the United States has recalibrated its pressure strategy toward Nicaragua: although its focus has always aimed at Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo as the couple in power, the novelty has been the personalization of the criticisms toward the “copresident”, who is seen at all levels of Washington as the institutional real power over her husband, ever more elderly and relegated to a more symbolic figure.
On the new political chessboard of the government of President Donald Trump, Marco Rubio the Secretary of State is an indispensable piece in the strategy toward the region, specifically in the face of the dictatorships of Venezuela (now decapitated), Cuba and Nicaragua. That is why the criticism cast this past January 30 by his office clearly showed the turn toward the copresident: “A year ago Rosario Murillo invented a “Copresidency” to consolidate her illegitimate control over Nicaragua: without elections, without a mandate, without legitimacy. Power based on repression and constitutional manipulation is not the will of the people,” expressed the State Department on their X account. “Cravenly she has denied Nicaraguans the right to a democratic vote because she knows that she cannot win.”
The same tone has extended to the House of Representatives in Washington, specifically to the Cuban American Congressperson María Elvira Salazar, who a week ago, in a hearing on religious freedom, said that Murillo is “the devil herself.” “This is a very clear message, which I am now going to send specifically to Rosario Murillo, who is the devil herself and that is why she is guiding her husband to not allow this type of activities to happen on Nicaraguan territory,” the Congressperson states, in reference to the religious persecution.
Sources with knowledge of the political context in Washington told DIVERGENTES that, in effect, there is a recalibration of the republican pressure on the way in which now the power sharing is understood between the presidential couple in El Carmen. The thesis is that, after the reordering at the end of 2023 “the effective authority has been formally assumed by Murillo more than by Ortega.”
“They understand the regime as a dynastic dictatorship, but it is pointed out that Murillo currently leads the power scheme, accompanied by ‘a new circle of power´ directly loyal to her… and even they now have a new organizational chart of that network,” maintains one of the sources in the US capital. “Structures are clearly specified under her orbit which include justice, security, economy, foreign policy and communication, in addition to pointing out several leaders who have not been the object of international sanctions. Leaders who are accomplices of the repression and kleptocracy.”
For his part, Manuel Orozco, analyst of the Interamerican Dialogue, also thinks that the Trump administration has observed these “changes of political players” carried out by the copresident. “There is a recognition that Murillo is the head of the political power in every sphere. In that sense, the tacit recognition of a `living dead´ Ortega is apparent, but also a change in the direction of pressuring Murillo and her followers within the circle of power,” Orozco insisted.
The political approach of the Trump administration revolves around identifying and cultivating political players within the circle who end up playing an instrument role in the power change, according to the analyst of the Interamerican Dialogue. “This does not mean that Nicaragua is Venezuela, or Cuba, or that there is a domino effect. It means that each country has a different treatment or management, the pressure on Nicaragua is happening gradually and with a bipartisan approach…and, lastly for the United States, Murillo cannot continue operating with impunity,” Orozco says.
The sociologist Juan Carlos Gutiérrez thinks that there are two key elements to understanding the turn to Murillo. “Ortega is already on his way out. He will not be the problem for sustaining an autocratic regime. The problem will be Rosario,” he states. According to the denationalized researcher, Murillo not only concentrates political control, but directs the functioning of the repressive and authoritarian system. “Ortega is left as an emblematic figure, useful inside the Frente and particularly for Rosario, but in terms of the functionality of the system and the capacity for resistance in the face of strong pressure from the United States, she is the key pillar,” he maintains.
More pressure on her
The political sources close to Washington maintain in addition that the previous sanctions have had a direct impact on specific individuals and institutions, reducing their margin of operation and affecting their reputation. That is why they highlight that the United States understood that they should be applied in a systematic way and accompanied by diplomatic pressure, to avoid cycles of repression, followed by partial concessions.
That pressure now has an echo in the co presidential couple, because since the capture of Maduro, Ortega as well as Murillo have lowered their criticisms of the United States. On the contrary, they collaborate on matters of drug trafficking and migration, and have made some concessions, like releasing political prisoners after requests from Washington. In addition, the most recent measure was canceling free visas for Cubans, who have used Nicaragua as a trampoline to migrate to the United States. A decision which occurs during the crisis that the island is suffering, after President Trump cut off their supply of Venezuelan oil.
In his last public appearance to give an award to the former Vice President Jaime Morales Carazo, Ortega avoided referring to Trump and his measures. While Murillo made an indirect allusion to the message of the State Department about her copresidency: “Being brave is knowing how to build peace, being brave is not waging war. That is defeat, war is defeat. It is assuming peace and defending it every day, protecting it every day and where there is a rupture of peace, restoring it every day, that is courage.”
Outside the recalibration of the pressure on Murillo, pressure is also moving on the legislative plane: In the US Senate a bill is being promoted to pursue the trade of illegal gold connected to the Ortega-Murillo regime, with the intention of cutting a source of financing which Washington considers key, while in the House of Representatives Congresspeople like Chris Smith and María Elvira Salazar presented a bill to expand and reinforce the already established sanctions in the Nica Act and the RENACER law through a new set of norms which restricts financial assistance and allows punishing individuals and sectors linked to the regime.
In this context, the sources in Washington pointed out that the political resistance and direct public questioning of Murillo impacts her symbolic leadership authority. “This political resistance weakens the moral authority of Murillo and demoralizes her,” they emphasize, explaining that the loss of reputation, public disparaging, and what is called “moral noise” can erode her legitimacy and affect the cohesion of her circle of power, a space in which Sandinista sources agree that the copresident generates “more fear that respect.”
Taken together, the sources in Washington maintain that the pressure will be stronger on the diplomatic level with bipartisan backing in the United States; compliance with commercial commitments is going to be demanded, the role of international financial organizations will be reviewed in granting loans, actors connected to the capture of the State will be sanctioned, and foreign powers will be warned about their relationship with Managua.
On that chessboard, the role of institutions like the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is also under scrutiny: even though the IMF certified economic growth and a certain amount of financial “resilience” of Nicaragua, it warned that this model is hanging from a thread in the face of risks like the US migration policy and the elevated structural uncertainty, generating challenges for the sustainability of the international financial backing for the copresidential regime.
