This is the best summary I could come up with:
Leonard Glenn Francis, a defense contractor who admitted to a $35 million bribery scheme in the largest corruption scandal in U.S. military history, will be extradited by Venezuela to the United States as part of a major prisoner swap between the estranged countries, senior Biden administration officials said Wednesday.
President Biden, in exchange, has agreed to grant clemency to Alex Saab, a close Maduro ally who was awaiting trial in Miami on federal money laundering charges, the officials said.
A senior administration official said Biden made the “extremely difficult decision” to grant clemency to Saab to bring Americans home and to “ensure that one of the most notorious fugitives from justice is returned and held to account.”
The Biden administration’s talks with the Maduro government reflect a significant shift in U.S. policy on Venezuela after a years-long effort under president Donald Trump to isolate Caracas and apply maximum pressure failed to oust the strongman.
The following year, the United States recognized then-National Assembly president Juan Guaidó, at the time Venezuela’s highest-ranking democratically elected official, as its rightful leader.
In October 2022, the Venezuelan government freed seven Americans, including the five remaining members of the Citgo Six group of oil executives held since 2017, in exchange for two nephews of Maduro’s wife who had been detained in the United States on drug trafficking charges.
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