What evidence did Hugo Carvajal provide in his Dec. 2 letter and where can the full text be reviewed?
Executive summary
Hugo Carvajal’s Dec. 2 letter, sent from U.S. custody and first published by the Dallas Express, presents a series of explosive allegations: that Venezuela’s political and military leadership operated as a “narco‑terrorist” enterprise that weaponized cocaine trafficking, cultivated alliances with armed groups and foreign intelligence services, embedded spies and used electoral technology for manipulation, and that he stands ready to cooperate with U.S. authorities [1] [2] [3]. The full text of the letter was published by the Dallas Express and subsequently reproduced or summarized by multiple outlets, but reporters and fact‑checkers note the document’s claims have not been independently verified and the letter does not include some of the sensational specifics circulating on social media [1] [4] [5] [6] [7].
1. What Carvajal actually presented in the letter: core allegations
Carvajal’s three‑page missive frames itself as an act of “atonement” and offers to “tell the full truth” about two decades of narcotics trafficking, espionage and alleged election manipulation directed or tolerated by Venezuela’s leadership, asserting the regime coordinated drug shipments and collaborated with Colombian guerrillas, Cuban operatives, and Hezbollah to target the United States [2] [3] [8]. He recounts, according to the reproduced text, that Venezuelan authorities provided “weapons, passports and impunity” to criminal and terrorist actors, that Russian and Cuban intelligence proposed operations from Venezuelan territory to penetrate U.S. communications, and that voting systems such as Smartmatic were used as tools of electoral manipulation—claims that Smartmatic has historically denied in other contexts [2] [8] [9].
2. What counts as “evidence” inside the letter and what it offers to investigators
The document itself is presented as a sworn narrative by a former head of military intelligence who says he “witnessed” these programs and pledges to cooperate with U.S. investigators, effectively offering his insider testimony and unspecified supporting materials to government authorities [2] [3]. Reporting indicates the letter contains descriptive allegations—names of institutions, reference to networks such as Tren de Aragua, descriptions of operational linkages to FARC and ELN, and claims about espionage activities—but does not, in publicly circulated versions, attach corroborating documents, transactional records, or a detailed, verifiable “list” of U.S. officials receiving kickbacks that some social posts later attributed to the text [4] [10] [5] [7].
3. Where the full text can be reviewed and how it was disseminated
The Dallas Express says it received the December 2 letter from Carvajal’s attorney, Robert Feitel, and published the full letter on Dec. 3; that publication has been the primary source for outlets republishing or summarizing the text [1] [4]. Other media organizations—ranging from the Miami Herald and Euronews to regional and ideological sites—reported on the letter, reproduced its text, or summarized its claims after the Dallas Express release [2] [8] [4]. Fact‑checking aggregators and follow‑ups (e.g., Snopes, Yahoo aggregation) point readers to the Dallas Express original as the document’s public venue while emphasizing reproduction and social amplification across multiple platforms [5] [6].
4. Limits, caveats and competing interpretations
Independent verification of Carvajal’s factual assertions is absent in the public record: news reports note U.S. law‑enforcement and intelligence agencies have not publicly confirmed receiving or acting on the letter’s specific allegations, and outlets including the Dallas Express acknowledged they did not independently validate every claim [4] [1]. Credibility concerns are explicit in reporting: Carvajal is a convicted narco‑trafficking defendant in U.S. custody who pleaded guilty, a status that both amplifies the potential value of his insider knowledge and raises questions about motive and reliability [2] [3]. Additionally, social‑media claims that the letter included a verified “Venezuela list” naming U.S. politicians have been debunked by fact‑checkers who note the published letter does not contain such a list or specific named U.S. officials [5] [6] [7].
5. What a cautious reader should do next
Interested parties should start with the Dallas Express publication of the Dec. 2 letter—identified by multiple outlets as the original public posting—while treating the document as a primary source that requires corroboration from independent intelligence, judicial records, or official investigative statements; subsequent reporting by established regional and international outlets and follow‑up inquiries to U.S. investigative bodies will be needed to move these claims from allegation toward substantiation or refutation [1] [2] [4].