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The United States government announced visa restrictions against more than 100 Nicaraguan officials and their family members for their “complicity” with the regime of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo. At the same time, it accused electoral magistrate Lumberto Campbell Hooker of having participated “directly” in the denial of medical care to political prisoner Brooklyn Rivera, who died while in state custody.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio described those sanctioned as “accomplices” in the consolidation of the dictatorship in Nicaragua, which international organizations have accused of serious human rights violations and the dismantling of democratic institutions in the country.
“The United States stands with the Nicaraguan people who, like Rivera, aspire to a free Nicaragua,” Rubio emphasized in a statement issued on June 8, 2026, announcing the new measures by the Donald Trump administration.
Brooklyn Rivera, a 73-year-old Miskito Indigenous leader, died on May 30, 2026, at 8:30 p.m., after more than 970 days of unlawful imprisonment. The dictatorship confirmed his death one day later, kept his body under police custody, and ordered his burial in Managua.
With these new visa restrictions, the United States says it has now sanctioned more than 2,350 “Nicaraguan officials and their family members for their complicity” with the dictatorship.
The decision was adopted under Presidential Proclamation 10309, a measure that “suspends entry into the United States, both for immigrants and nonimmigrants, of members of the Government of Nicaragua and other individuals who formulate, implement, or benefit from policies or actions that undermine democratic institutions.”
Lumberto Campbell Directly Accused
The top U.S. diplomat directly accused Campbell Hooker—who had previously been sanctioned by Washington—of being directly involved in the “denial of medical care to Brooklyn Rivera and preventing his family from burying him.”
“The United States,” he warned, “will not ignore the Murillo-Ortega dictatorship’s responsibility for the horrific death of political prisoner Brooklyn Rivera.”
Campbell Hooker appeared in photographs released by the regime on May 27, 2026, when authorities reported the Indigenous leader’s “serious” health condition.
The images show the Caribbean Coast magistrate standing beside Brooklyn Rivera as he lay bedridden in a hospital. Days later, Campbell also took part in the wake organized by the regime in Managua.
The funeral ceremonies, held at the Sierras de Paz cemetery, were tightly controlled by the Ortega regime after it prevented Rivera’s family from transporting his body to the North Caribbean Coast for burial, in accordance with the Miskito leader’s explicitly stated wishes.
Even after his death, “my father remains kidnapped,” Tininiska Rivera said in an interview with CONFIDENCIAL and Esta Semana. “They did not even grant us that right—the right to say goodbye to him,” she said.
Since May 31, at least six of Rivera’s relatives have remained missing after traveling from Bilwi to Managua to claim the Indigenous leader’s body.
Since September 2023, the regime had ignored repeated requests from Rivera’s family and the international community for proof that he was alive. Rivera’s daughter emphasized that at the time of his arrest, “my father left his home in excellent health, walking on his own and fully able to care for himself.”
