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A federal agent made a daring pitch to Nicolás Maduro’s chief pilot: Surreptitiously divert the Venezuelan president’s plane to a place where US authorities could nab the strongman.

In exchange, the agent told the pilot in a clandestine meeting, he would be made a very rich man.

The conversation was tense, and Maduro’s pilot left noncommittal, though he gave the agent, Edwin Lopez, his cell number — a sign he might be interested in helping the US government.

Over the next 16 months, even after retiring from his government job in July, Lopez kept at it. He chatted with the pilot over an encrypted messaging app.

The untold, intrigue-filled saga of how Lopez tried to flip the pilot has all the elements of a Cold War spy thriller — luxury private jets, a secret meeting at an airport hangar, high-stakes diplomacy and the delicate wooing of a key Maduro lieutenant. There was even a final machination aimed at rattling the Venezuelan president about the pilot’s true loyalties.

open image in gallery A Dassault Falcon 900 EX, with the tail number T7-ESPRT, that was seized in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, at the request of the United States in May 2024, top, and a Dassault Falcon 2000EX, with the tail number YV3360, seized in Santo Domingo at the request of the United States in February 2025 ( AP )

More broadly, the scheme reveals the extent — and often slapdash fashion — to which the US has for years sought to topple Maduro, who it blames for destroying the oil-rich nation’s democracy while providing a lifeline to drug traffickers, terrorist groups and communist-run Cuba.

Since returning to the White House, Donald Trump has taken an even harder line.