US Air Force Veteran Joseph St. Clair Freed From Venezuelan Detention

‘We are overwhelmed with joy and gratitude,’ St. Clair’s parents say in a statement.

U.S. Air Force veteran Joseph St. Clair (L) seated aboard an airplane next to special presidential envoy Ric Grenell on May 20, 2025. Richard Grenell via X via Reuters

Joseph St. Clair, a U.S. Air Force veteran held captive in Venezuela for nearly seven months, has been freed, his family announced on May 20, while expressing gratitude to President Donald Trump and key members of his administration for securing his release.

“This news came suddenly, and we are still processing it—but we are overwhelmed with joy and gratitude,” Joseph St. Clair’s parents, Scott and Patti St. Clair, said in a statement.

St. Clair, a four-tour Afghanistan War veteran from Hansville, Washington, disappeared in November 2024 while on a trip near the Colombia–Venezuela border. His family later learned he had been detained by the Maduro regime after allegedly straying too close to Venezuelan territory while visiting a friend’s family member.

“We learned that Joe, who was working in Colombia, took a trip near the border and was abducted,” Scott St. Clair told KTTH’s Jason Rantz. “They saw his military credentials, and all of this really only coming from the captives that were brought back.”

St. Clair was one of at least nine Americans deemed wrongfully detained in Venezuela, a country that human rights groups say has used foreign nationals as political bargaining chips.

Confirmation of St. Clair’s captivity came in February, when the U.S. consulate in Bogotá, the capital of Colombia, contacted the family to notify them of Joseph’s detention in Venezuela. In the weeks that followed, his father launched a campaign to secure his freedom, turning to social media and reaching out to Adam Boehler, special presidential envoy for hostage affairs, who responded within days.

“Adam spent thirty minutes talking to me and listening to Joe’s story,” St. Clair’s father said in a statement on social media. “He immediately expressed concern and empathy and promised to help bring Joe and all Americans home. This was the first sliver of light from a very dark room.”

St. Clair was later formally designated as “wrongfully detained,” triggering a U.S. policy shift that increased pressure on Venezuela’s socialist regime.

“The day when Joe was officially designated as ‘wrongfully detained,’ by order of the President was another day where hope abounded,” St. Clair’s father said in the statement, adding that advocacy groups, including the James Foley Foundation and Hostage Aid Worldwide, amplified the family’s pleas.

While the details of St. Clair’s release were not immediately clear, the family credited Trump, Boehler, special presidential envoy Ric Grenell, deputy assistant to the president Sebastian Gorka, and consultant Jonathan Franks for their role in securing Joseph’s release.

“We remain in prayer and solidarity with the families of those who are still being held,” the family said in a statement. “We will never stop loving and supporting them as they continue their fight to be reunited with their loved ones.”

St. Clair’s release adds to a string of recent successes for the Trump administration, which has made the repatriation of American detainees a central foreign policy priority.

In recent weeks, the administration has secured the release from Russia of American teacher Marc Fogel in a prisoner swap, and American-Russian dual national Ksenia Karelina, who had been jailed in Yekaterinburg, Russia, on treason charges. Belarusian-American pro-democracy activist Youras Ziankovich was also freed after nearly four years in a Belarusian penal colony.

In March, the administration facilitated the return of six American citizens from Kuwait, where they had been imprisoned for years on drug-related charges. And earlier in May, five members of Venezuela’s political opposition, who had taken refuge at the Argentine diplomatic residence in Caracas for over a year, were quietly extracted in what Trump administration officials called a “successful rescue.”