US asked Fulbright scholar to spy on Cubans, Venezuelans

On a Fulbright scholarship to conduct research in Bolivia, Alex van Schaick had no training in espionage. But that didn’t stop an official at the U.S. Embassy for inquiring about his services. On Friday, van Schaick told media officials that a member of the U.S. Embassy asked him to keep tabs on Venezuelan and Cuban workers during his time in Bolivia. “The part that obviously startled me was when he just … said, ‘should you happen to encounter any Venezuelans or Cubans in the field – doctors, field workers, whatever – we’d like you to report their names and their information, like where they live, to the U.S. Embassy,’” he told ABC News. “And then he said something along the lines of ‘we know they’re out there, we just want to keep tabs on them.’