María Corina Machado urged her compatriots to maintain hope while vowing to fight for democracy after a senior Trump envoy cut a deal with President Nicolás Maduro to facilitate U.S. deportations.

The Trump administration’s decision Sunday to end the protection from deportation for hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans living in the United States is based on the notion that conditions have improved in the South American country to the point that its citizens no longer need to be safeguarded from a repressive dictatorship.