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venezuela
Trump Official Denies Stealing Venezuela's Oil One Hour After Boasting Country is 'Forced to Work' With US
"We have a lot of leverage over Venezuela. We control the sale of oil outside of their country," said US Energy Secretary Chris Wright.
Sep 06, 2026
US Energy Secretary Chris Wright on Sunday denied that the Trump administration was stealing Venezuela's oil just one hour after boasting that the country is being "forced to work" with the United States.
During a Sunday morning interview on ABC News, Wright was asked why he trusted interim Venezuelan President Delcy Rodriguez, given that she was previously the vice president of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, who was abducted by the American military earlier this year and brought to the US to face narco-terrorism, drug trafficking, and weapons charges.
"We have a lot of leverage over Venezuela," Wright explained. "We control the sale of oil outside of their country. So right now, they are forced to work in partnership with us, and they are working in partnership with us."
RADDATZ: You attacked the Maduro regime as a "socialist dictatorship." Delcy Rodriguez was the VP of that regime. Why do you trust her?
CHRIS WRIGHT: We have a lot of leverage over Venezuela. We control the sale of oil outside of their country. Right now they are forced to work… pic.twitter.com/FV5eUhsRed
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) September 6, 2026
Shortly after, during an interview on Fox News, Wright grew indignant at the suggestion that the US was forcing Venezuela to give up its oil through threats of military force and other coercive measures.
"This is a home run!" Wright said of the Trump administration's arrangements with the Venezuelan government. "These senators saying we're stealing their oil at gunpoint, nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, the more oil that's produced in Venezuela, including with the deal with the US government, the more royalties and tax revenues go to the Venezuelan government and the Venezuelan people."
Chris Wright on Venezuela: "These senators saying we're stealing their oil at gunpoint -- nothing could be further from the truth" pic.twitter.com/idsdl025q9
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) September 6, 2026
Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado, who was supportive of the US abducting Maduro, last week criticized the Trump administration for cutting a deal with what she said was still a corrupt and oppressive government in Caracas.
"The wealth of our land does not belong to an illegitimate regime," Machado said in a video posted on social media, "it belongs to the Venezuelan people."
In an analysis published last week, economist Paul Krugman accused the Trump administration of concocting a "plot to steal Venezuela's oil," which he described as equal parts "vile and deeply stupid."
The deal is vile, Krugman said, because it validates " everything the Latin American left has ever said about US imperialism" in the region.
And it is simultaneously stupid, he argued, because the investments required to improve Venezuela's oil infrastructure will be so great that its benefits are unlikely to materialize in the near future, if at all.
"Venezuelan oil currently sells for around $70 a barrel on world markets," Krugman wrote. "But as I said, getting that oil out will require huge investments in infrastructure. Nor does Venezuela oil come gushing out when you drill a well: As one expert put it, 'it comes out of the ground with the consistency of cold peanut butter.'"
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Democrats Attack Trump’s Venezuela Imperialism... From the Right!
We face an unprecedented fascist and imperialist threat from the Trump administration; mealy-mouthed centrist imperialism just won’t do the trick.
Sep 04, 2026
On Friday, the Trump administration announced a “deal” handing the United States 65 billion barrels of Venezuelan crude oil, roughly a fifth of the country’s total reserves (the largest on Earth), on leases running up to 100 years. They would give $200 billion, or just about $3 a barrel (just 3% of market value) to Venezuela. If this was a fair “deal,” following market value, it should be over $6 trillion. That may be the biggest fraud in human history.
Billionaires are already circling like vultures. A Coinbase co-founder is in talks to run his own Venezuelan oil fields, and pro-Israel megadonor Paul Singer is positioned to profit too. The arrangement comes eight months after US special forces stormed and carpet-bombed Caracas and abducted President Nicolás Maduro.
Marines have openly occupied the streets of Caracas since, doing numerous muscle-flexing helicopter raids across the city. The administration has said Venezuela is “not ready yet” for elections, despite running their own elections for decades—plus, why does the US get to dictate when and if countries can have elections, anyway?
The Pentagon itself reportedly holds a 35% stake in the venture set to extract the oil, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio runs the country as its de facto “viceroy," according to The New York Times. The whole scheme was backed by neocons like the Vandenberg Coalition and the Florida lobby.
Would the US accept it if China, Russia, Iran, or Mexico kidnapped a US president, bombed American fishermen, seized American oil fields, and installed a puppet government because officials in Beijing or Tehran deemed it “in the national interest”?
I guess they’ve stopped pretending this was ever about democracy or drugs (the original bogus reason). It is now even being sold as the cure-all for a worsening recession and a pre-midterm buy-off, even as the affordability crisis worsens.
President Donald Trump and the neocons’ message seems to be: It’s fine to steal trillions from other countries, kidnap their leaders, kill civilians, and install puppet governments, for profit. We skipped the Cold War and went straight back to old-school imperialism.
As almost always, most of the windfall from this “deal” will go to the super rich. Gas prices keep climbing, but oil majors are hitting record highs on Wall Street. Chevron’s stock sits near an all-time high as it committed $7 billion to the new venture. Canada’s largest oil investor also hit an all-time high in the stock market the day of the news.
You may ask yourself, how have Democrats responded to all this depravity and barbarism? Well, would it shock you if I said most Democratic politicians have attacked Trump from the right, and legitimated his warmongering? Unfortunately, it probably won’t.
My home state’s senator, the ever-boring Tim Kaine (D-Va.), joined by Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), filed a war-powers resolution to block what they called an “illegal war” with Venezuela. “Illegal” is the operative word. Their objection is that Congress never voted on this, not that invading, bombing, and looting a sovereign country is morally wrong.
In a Tweet, quoting the right-wing oil-funded Wall Street Journal, Kaine added that Trump had "Invaded Venezuela, Removed the dictator Maduro but... Kept his VP in power While blocking opposition leader and Nobel laureate Maria Corina Machado from returning home and delaying all talk of elections," ending on "So the US could control Venezuelan oil in violation of its constitution!"
Now we see why Trump
Invaded Venezuela
Removed the dictator Maduro but . . .
Kept his VP in power
While blocking opposition leader and Nobel laureate Maria Corina Machado from returning home
And delaying all talk of elections
So the US could control Venezuelan oil in violation…
— Tim Kaine (@timkaine) August 29, 2026
He's basically saying, "We want to coup foreign governments to put in a far-right puppet and take their oil, LEGALLY." We don't need Mickey Mouse anti-imperialists.
If Congress had passed a resolution approving all of it, the way it did for the wars in Iraq, Libya, and Afghanistan, would that make it morally acceptable? Of course not. Torture under the Bush administration was legal, as was the US colonization of the Philippines, and even the Transatlantic Slave Trade, for that matter.
But for Democratic leadership, this was never about principle, or backing a truly progressive foreign policy vision; they just care about opposing Trump for its sake, and respecting the oh-so-perfect process. Though legislating morality is the purpose of law, legality and morality are not the same—and in this case, legal approval means nothing.
This is nothing new. Democrats have spent decades backing a hawkish, neoliberal Venezuela policy. During the 2002 coup that briefly ousted democratically elected president Hugo Chávez, then-Sen. Joe Biden dodged the question on television before pivoting, months later, to demand Washington “ratchet this up” against Chávez. By 2006 he was warning of an “axis of oil” led by Venezuela, echoing talking points from neoconservatives like Iraq War architect John Bolton.
Washington-aligned opposition forces also waged the 2002-2003 PDVSA oil lockout meant to strangle Chávez’s government economically. In 2019, when Trump anointed the unelected Juan Guaidó as president, Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) recognized him, and most congressional Democrats stayed silent or lined up behind her.
Now, with the Pentagon routinely bombing fishing boats off Venezuela's coast for months, which it says, without evidence, are narco boats, killing hundreds of civilians, Democrats’ loudest objection was, again, that Congress hadn’t authorized it.
They wanted to see “proof” of these being narco boats, rather than focusing on the more important point: Are we okay with just murdering any suspected criminal? This is the kind of logic that leads to right-wing politicians arguing to kill thieves and petty drug peddlers, like in Brazil and the Philippines.
Hillary Clinton, of all people, said more than many elected Democrats would. Now Democrats are lining up behind Delcy’s far-right replacement-in-waiting, María Corina Machado. Even the Central Intelligence Agency thought she was too extreme and alienating to be Maduro’s replacement. Yet, Sens. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) and Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) met with Machado months before she shamefully won the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize (before giving it to Trump). Durbin later co-sponsored a resolution honoring her alongside far-right Republican Sens. Ted Cruz (Texas) and Rick Scott (Florida). Most Democrats have been backing her as the next president, calling her a “champion of democracy,” among other ridiculous stolen valor.
Machado, backed by the Bush administration and US intelligence agencies, backed the 2002 coup; relentlessly pushed for and defended the sanctions that starved her own country; wants to privatize PDVSA and hand away her country’s, in her own words, “trillions of dollars of natural resources” to the US on Donald Trump Jr.'s podcast; and has praised autocrats like Daniel Noboa, Javier Milei, and Nayib Bukele.
Machado is “completely aligned,” historian Greg Grandin told Democracy Now!, “with the most militarist and darkest face of US imperialism. She was the main force lobbying for the coup against Maduro, and has supported the boat strikes on fishermen, her own fellow citizens. She has been supported by neocon war criminals like John Bolton, Elliott Abrams, and Mike Pompeo—does that sound like someone the Democrats should be backing?
There are, still, some exceptions worth naming. Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) has made the actual moral case, not just the legal one, calling Trump’s approach a return to "the era of gunboat diplomacy where might makes right” and saying plainly, “It's not just that it's strategically wrong. It's morally wrong.” Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) has also warned against letting “control of the world’s most powerful military” rest in one man's hands, and called out Trump’s imperialism plainly.
Expanding the anti-war coalition, libertarian Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) has repeatedly co-sponsored bipartisan war-powers resolutions with Democrats Rep. Jim McGovern (Mass.) and Joaquin Castro (Texas), arguing, “This is not about drugs; this is about oil and regime change... our troops are not pawns to be risked for the profits of oil companies and investment bankers.” A real transpartisan anti-war bloc is possible, it just needs bold politicians to lead it.
We face an unprecedented fascist and imperialist threat. Washington is using its world-bending power to expand its territory, remove leaders who won’t play ball with US crony and intelligence interests, and turn sovereign countries into de facto American possessions. Venezuela, as even the often-disappointing New York Times has reported, has effectively become a US colony.
Mealy-mouthed centrist imperialism just won’t do the trick. A legal invasion is still an invasion. Pursuing “US interests” doesn't give any official carte blanche to roam the world like rogue thugs. Would the US accept it if China, Russia, Iran, or Mexico kidnapped a US president, bombed American fishermen, seized American oil fields, and installed a puppet government because officials in Beijing or Tehran deemed it “in the national interest”? They might nuke them within the hour.
All empires end at some point. When it does, no power will grant the US the mercy it denied the countries it pillaged.
Democrats, and American officials generally, should recognize their precarious position in a world increasingly turning toward rivals like China, and finally build that coalition in earnest. Thankfully, there are now constituencies challenging Washington’s neo-imperial consensus, in academia, in think tanks, at the State Department, and even in Congress, that are growing too significant to ignore.
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Venezuela Under Siege: What Should Progressives Do?
Our first responsibility is not to prescribe Venezuela's political course, but to challenge the coercive power our own government exercises over it.
Sep 02, 2026
Ever since Hugo Chávez became Venezuela’s president in 1999 and initiated the Bolivarian Revolution, the country has been under siege by the US. The aggression escalated with the kidnapping of its lawful president, part of a larger and accelerating assertion of US imperial power worldwide. The Bolivarian Revolution survived but is in a forced tactical retreat.
For progressives outside Venezuela, this presents a difficult question. How should we respond when a government resisting US domination makes compromises that we may oppose, but does so under conditions largely imposed by Washington?
This article argues that criticism has its place. But it also needs to be contextualized in the larger struggle over Venezuela’s sovereignty and the consequences of weakening a government confronting overwhelming US power.
Chávez: Founding of the Bolivarian Revolution
Tension between solidarity with an actually existing revolutionary process and criticism of its compromises has recurred throughout the Bolivarian Revolution. Among the first on the left to part company with the Chavista government were anarchists, who proclaimed that they were second to none in supporting revolutions against imperialism—until those projects succeeded in achieving state power.
We can all agree that the Rodríguez government faces demands backed by overwhelming US power and unite to oppose the continuing imperialist siege. Those of us living in the imperial core must aim the main blow at the conditions that have necessitated such retreats.
This tendency still affirmed their abstract solidarity with “the people” but not with their chosen representatives. They felt betrayed because the Bolivarian leadership failed to fulfill their expectations to build a workers’ state on a suitably expeditious timetable.
Riding a global commodities boom, the Bolivarian Revolution funded major social welfare programs, prioritizing poor and working people. To finance these measures, over half of Venezuela’s oil exports and 60% of its overall exports were sold to the US. Dependency on oil sales deepened, with oil accounting for over 95% of the country's foreign earnings.
Chávez proclaimed the goal of a socialist future, although he pardoned the unsuccessful 2002 coup plotters in an effort—perhaps mistaken—to encourage a cooperative domestic business class. He pragmatically sought opportunities to negotiate with them.
Maduro: Intensification of the Imperialist Siege
When Chávez died in March 2013, his chosen successor Nicolás Maduro won the snap presidential election. Maduro carried the Bolivarian project forward but under geopolitical conditions markedly different from his predecessor. Venezuela scholar Steve Ellner argues that there were no substantive political differences between the two leaders.
During Chávez’s illness, economic problems had accumulated (e.g., a dysfunctional currency exchange system). Maduro was under intense pressure from the moment he entered office.
Immediately, the US-backed and funded opposition started the guarimbas, demonstrations intended to accomplish by violence what they had failed to achieve at the ballot box. Washington, meanwhile, stepped up its hybrid war. Soon oil prices crashed and the US, under President Barack Obama, initiated ever more punishing sanctions in 2015.
Under these coercive measures, the Venezuelan economy by 2019 was in free fall with inflation over 100,000%. Never had an economy contracted so much in modern peacetime.
At this time of maximum weakness, a faction of the Venezuelan Communist Party developed a strategic disagreement with the governing coalition. It argued that the revolution should confront its class enemies more aggressively and expropriate major corporations, rather than seek a temporary rapprochement.
The nearly overwhelming task of righting the economy was ultimately achieved under Maduro's leadership. After precipitous economic contraction, Venezuela has experienced positive economic growth since 2021. Never had a petro-economy achieved such a turnaround, which included near food sovereignty. To do so, the government relied foremost on the strong Chavista base. It also had to appeal to nationalistic elements among the bourgeoisie and offer them economic incentives to secure their cooperation.
Venezuela was not unique in making such accommodations. During this period, Cuba and Nicaragua—the two other Latin American countries striving for socialism—also introduced market-oriented reforms. With all three countries, the measures were pragmatic adjustments to a world economy dominated by the US and hostile to socialism.
Kidnapping of Maduro
The events leading up to Maduro’s abduction on January 3 involved an ever-intensifying regime-change campaign by the US in concert with its allies: asphyxiating sanctions, stolen assets, diplomatic isolation, cyberattacks, assassination attempts, mercenary invasions, among other measures. The last two months saw a total naval blockade on Venezuelan oil shipments, cutting the country’s economic lifeline.
Regardless, Maduro repeatedly maintained his longstanding willingness to negotiate with Washington. Just two days before his abduction, Maduro outlined a program of accommodation in his annual New Year’s interview with Ignacio Ramonet. This is the program that his successor Delcy Rodríguez has followed, including the amnesty and hydrocarbons laws.
The Bolivarian Revolution persevered. Its accommodations may be understood as tactical responses to unfavorable conditions rather than as a full abandonment of the project.
The fact that Maduro did not waver and the Bolivarian Revolution did not break presented a dilemma for Washington. The US—especially as its aggression against oil-rich Iran was heating up—needed access to Venezuelan oil. Neither country benefited by keeping the oil in the ground.
Yet the US had painted itself into a corner. The Trump administration had demonized Maduro as a narco-trafficker. Even though Maduro was more than willing to negotiate, the US had precluded that option. The kidnapping followed.
Rodríguez: Negotiated Sovereignty
The US invasion of Venezuela on January 3 demonstrated to both the leadership and the Venezuelan grassroots that they were alone—no country came to their defense. Whatever guardrails had existed before on the hegemon were down.
Yet the Bolivarian Revolution did not collapse. The highly polarized nation did not fall into civil unrest between Chavistas and opposition—if anything, it unified. The far-right María Corina Machado did not make her triumphal return to Caracas. Instead, that part of the opposition found itself discredited and in disarray.
In a seamless constitutional transition, Maduro’s vice president was sworn in as president. The Chavista movement united behind Acting President Delcy Rodríguez. Venezuela’s national recovery continues under a negotiated sovereignty where the US now bargains—with the ever-present threat of an even more lethal military action—over matters that should be the sole purview of Venezuelans.
Finding a way forward
The Bolivarian Revolution persevered. Its accommodations may be understood as tactical responses to unfavorable conditions rather than as a full abandonment of the project.
For international solidarity activists, the central question is how to forge a stance that advances the anti-imperialist struggle under these conditions. Those of us who support national sovereignty and self-determination should understand that what Venezuela is suffering relates to our failure to constrain our own imperialists.
Aiming the punch at the target. We can all agree that the Rodríguez government faces demands backed by overwhelming US power and unite to oppose the continuing imperialist siege. Those of us living in the imperial core must aim the main blow at the conditions that have necessitated such retreats.
We can all unite on actions to demand freeing President Maduro and “First Combatant” Cilia Flores from jail in New York City, ending sanctions, and returning stolen assets.
Differences among progressives. A useful distinction can be made between disagreements within the “left camp” and the fundamental conflict with imperialism. This does not mean suppressing differences or assuming that they are unimportant. Rather, it suggests approaching tensions among forces resisting imperialism in ways that seek common ground and avoid turning secondary differences into antagonistic ones.
Contextualizing criticism. Under pressure from Washington, the Rodríguez government deported former Venezuelan diplomat and minister Alex Saab and has established consular relations with Israel. These are among the bitter pills to swallow. Criticism of such actions may be entirely warranted, but should be assessed in light of the extraordinary constraints under which the Rodríguez government is operating.
A related example is Cuba, which is forced to tolerate a US military base and torture center in Guantánamo, has had the indignity of having the US secretary of war and the commander of the US Southern Command visit, and has introduced pro-capitalist economic reforms. Those reforms should be understood as “strategic adaptation” according to an article in Black Agenda Report. While not welcoming these accommodations to the US siege, international solidarity activists still unite with and defend Cuba.
Considering the alternatives. For example, the US and its allies waged wars of aggression and deposed Iraq’s Saddam Hussein in 2003, Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, and Syria’s Bashar al-Assad in 2024. There were left critiques of these leaders but, in all instances, there were no viable left alternatives to them; nor were conditions for their people improved by their removal. There is no “third way” in a war.
This suggests that the relevant question is not whether a preferable government can be imagined, but what forces actually stand to replace the existing government. For Venezuela, if not the Rodríguez government, what is the actual alternative?
After 26 years of siege and domestic polarization, the Venezuelan people yearn for peace, reconciliation, and reconstruction—more so than ever after the devastating twin earthquakes on June 24. For those of us abroad, we can only imagine the difficulties of life under sanctions from the US and its allies.
Regional trends. Developments in Venezuela reflect a broader shift in Latin America under the “Donroe Doctrine,” where Trump’s reactionary wave has flooded the former Pink Tide. Venezuela should therefore be understood in the context of this region-wide sea change.
Not since Maduro’s election in 2024 has a leftist won in the region. We have witnessed a succession of far-rightists replace center-left presidents in Latin America. Last year, Nasry Asfura replaced Xiomara Castro in Honduras, José Antonio Kast replaced Gabriel Boric in Chile, and Rodrigo Paz replaced Luis Arce in Bolivia. This year, Abelardo de la Espriella replaced Gustavo Petro in Colombia. Coming up in October is the Brazilian presidential election pitting Flávio Bolsonaro against incumbent Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, with Trump actively interfering as he did in the other contests.
In all cases, the incumbents faced considerable criticism from the left. Yet whatever their shortcomings, the alternatives have been, or would be, less desirable.
Conclusion
Venezuela is not an isolated case. How progressives weigh criticism against solidarity, assess governments operating under US pressure, and consider the actual alternatives is increasingly relevant throughout the region.
Remarkably, given the intense pressure from the imperialists, the core Chavista leadership, the Socialist Party (PSUV), the civil-military union, the high courts and legislature, and the communes and grassroots organizations have all remained unified. Preserving that unity is particularly important; Bolivia’s experience of left fragmentation offers a cautionary example.
Our tasks are to educate the broader public about what is happening in Venezuela under extreme duress and to take collective action against the imperialist siege.
Between the Rubio State Department and corporate media, on one hand, and rejection of the Rodríguez government by some on the left, on the other, there is a vast intermediate terrain that needs to have a voice.
Whatever disagreements progressives may have with decisions made in Caracas, those decisions belong ultimately to Venezuelans. Our first responsibility is not to prescribe Venezuela's political course, but to challenge the coercive power our own government exercises over it. The Venezuelans have not told us how to make our revolution; we should do the same for them.
Our tasks are to educate the broader public about what is happening in Venezuela under extreme duress and to take collective action against the imperialist siege. The Bolivarian Revolution has not failed. But the project urgently requires relief.
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Trump Is Economically Dumb — and That's How You Should Understand His Attempt to Steal Venezuela's Oil
File Trump’s Venezuelan oil deal and ridiculous claims about what it represents with all the other false things he says about the economy.
Sep 01, 2026
Donald Trump is not very good at running the economy, but he does have a great imagination about how he runs the economy. Trump continually boasts about the incredible amount of foreign investment coming into the country. It was $20 trillion last I heard, but it might be up to $30 or $40 trillion the next time Trump decides to boast about it.
This boast has absolutely nothing to do with reality. Contrary to what Trump says, there is no boom in auto factories or any other factories coming into the United States. Factory construction has actually plummeted since Trump came into the White House, after booming under Biden.
The looniness about the investment boom should be kept in mind when considering Trump’s deal to take control of 65 billion barrels of Venezuela’s oil. Trump is promising that this deal will both lower gas prices and be used to refill the Strategic Petroleum Reserves that he has largely drained as a result of his war on Iran.
If Venezuela doesn’t honor this deal, what will a future administration do, take them to court? Or will they send US soldiers to die for Venezuela’s oil?
While people are naturally offended by the blatant imperialism in this deal, that is precisely the reason why there is not much cause to be concerned. The basic story is, because the deal is so transparently an effort by the United States to steal oil from a country that it controls militarily, it is virtually guaranteed that as soon as the country is not run by a U.S.-installed dictator, Trump’s deal will be dumped in the trash.
This point was well-made by Venezuelan economist and opposition leader Ricardo Haussman (also cited in a piece by Michael Tomasky in The New Republic). The deal is seen as a joke by pretty much everyone in Venezuela.
If Venezuela doesn’t honor this deal, what will a future administration do, take them to court? Or will they send US soldiers to die for Venezuela’s oil?
In terms of its immediate impact, there is not some spigot that can be turned on that will get massive amounts of Venezuela’s oil flowing. It’s currently producing around 1.25 million barrels a day. While it has massive reserves, its production facilities deteriorated badly as a result of U.S. sanctions. The country was largely unable to get needed parts, and it lacked funding because it was prevented from selling its oil to much of the world.
Oil production can only get back to its 3 million barrel a day turn-of-the-century pace with billions of dollars of foreign investment. It is unlikely that this deal will make companies happier about putting large sums at risk. Any investment will only pay off over many years, long after Trump will be out of office.
It also is not plausible to use Venezuela’s oil to refill the Strategic Reserves. Venezuela’s oil is very heavy and highly acidic. The Strategic Reserve is designed for light, alkaline oil. It could not easily store Venezuela’s oil.
In short, file Trump’s Venezuelan oil deal with the $60 trillion in foreign investment pouring into the country. It exists only in his head.
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Trump Accused of Using Iran War Energy Crisis as 'Cover for a Resource Grab' in Venezuela
"Oil reserves in Venezuela will do nothing to lower families’ bills today," said one campaigner.
Aug 31, 2026
President Donald Trump was accused over the weekend of exploiting an energy crisis of his own creation to make the case for what he dubiously characterized as "the biggest oil deal in world history" with Venezuela, a country that the US illegally attacked earlier this year in an operation to abduct its then-president, Nicolás Maduro.
“Trump drove up gas prices by launching a devastating war with Iran. Now he is using the energy crisis he created as cover for a resource grab of Venezuela’s oil," Allie Rosenbluth, US program manager at Oil Change International, said in a statement on Sunday. "The announcement confirms his aggression against Venezuela was about securing power, profits, and fossil fuels."
The newly announced agreement—which Trump and Venezuela's acting president, Delcy Rodríguez, said involved the development of fields with potentially 65 billion barrels of oil—came as gas prices in the US remained above $4 per gallon. According to AAA, this month is "poised to set a new record as the most expensive August at the pump," as the national average price for a gallon of gas has been above $4 every day of the month for the first time.
Rosenbluth, like other analysts, questioned the impact of Trump's deal with Venezuela on the US energy crisis, which has become a major political problem for the president and his Republican Party heading into the midterms.
Trump, who has significant fossil fuel company holdings, claimed the deal would "substantially lower gas prices" and help replenish the US Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which is at its lowest level in decades after the president ordered the release of 172 million barrels following Iran's closure of the Strait of Hormuz in response to US aggression.
Trump tries to retroactively justify his war of aggression against Venezuela by saying he will use its oil to replenish America's strategic reserves, which are depleted because of his aggressive war of choice against Iran. What is wrong with this "logic"? https://t.co/Grh3ov8Jhw
— Kenneth Roth (@KenRoth) August 30, 2026
Trump announced the deal with Venezuela on Friday, which marked six months since the US and Israel started bombing Iran.
"Oil reserves in Venezuela will do nothing to lower families’ bills today," said Rosenbluth. "Increasing production of this extremely heavy and dirty crude would take years and billions of dollars. A bet on new Venezuelan oil production that may take a decade or more to materialize is a bet against solving the climate crisis already destroying lives and livelihoods every day. The immediate winners are the oil companies and private investors given access to Venezuela’s resources, while Venezuelans lose sovereignty, and communities in Venezuela and along the US Gulf Coast face more pollution and harm."
“Trump’s attacks on Iran and Venezuela expose the vicious cycle of fossil fuel dependence: Wars secure access to oil, oil fuels violence and militarization, prices become more volatile, and fossil fuel companies profit while ordinary people pay," Rosenbluth added. "Real energy security comes from phasing out fossil fuels and investing in affordable, renewable energy.”
Gerald Kepes, president of the consultancy firm Competitive Energy Strategies, noted in an interview with NPR that the US has no "government-owned operational capability per se in the oil and gas sector," raising the question of "who's going to operate on the ground?"
Chevron is currently the only US oil company actively producing in Venezuela. NPR reported that "there's a private Venezuelan company involved in the deal," but the details remain murky.
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'Mobster Language': Trump Says Venezuelan Oil Will Replenish US Reserves
"I used to spend so much time trying to prove that the US was not interested in promoting democracy and just preferred autocratic governments that give us whatever we want. And now he just posts this every day on social media," one journalist wrote.
Aug 30, 2026
President Donald Trump was accused of naked gangsterism and revisionist history on Sunday when he announced that Venezuelan oil would be used to refill the US Strategic Petroleum Reserve.
"One of the things I am going to do with the Venezuelan Oil is fill up the Strategic National Reserves which, because of Sleepy Joe Biden, has been virtually emptied. The 'topping out' process will begin very shortly, and is a Gift from Venezuela to the People of the United States," Trump wrote on Truth Social.
The oil in question comes from a deal announced between the governments of Trump and acting Venezuelan President Delcy Rodriguez on Friday, which would allow the US to take majority control of 65 billion barrels worth of Venezuelan oil preserves. While Rodriguez has spoken favorably of the arrangement, it is hard to know how freely she speaks and acts given that her predecessor Nicolás Maduro was kidnapped by US forces in January.
"Describing oil you are looting by force as a 'Gift from Venezuela to the People of the United States' is straight mobster language," Drop Site News journalist Ryan Grim wrote on social media in response to Trump's statement on Sunday.
"No one told the demented jerk that he drained over 100 million barrels from the Strategic Reserves?"
Nathan J. Robinson, editor-in-chief of Current Affairs, also commented on the imperialism inherent in Trump's remarks, writing: "I feel like I used to spend so much time trying to prove that the US was not interested in promoting democracy and just preferred autocratic governments that give us whatever we want. And now he just posts this every day on social media."
In an article on Sunday entitled "Trump’s Venezuela Oil Grab Reprises Industry’s Neocolonial Past," Bloomberg reported that the oil deal reminded some analysts of 20th century US colonialism in Latin America.
Venezuelan economist Francisco Rodríguez told Bloomberg that Venezuela is “functioning as a protectorate of the US in all but name,” and that the current deal “isn’t furthering the interests of Venezuelans. It’s about securing the economic and security interests of the United States.”
New York University associate history professor Alejandro Velasco, meanwhile, compared today's Venezuela with the Central American "Banana Republics" that were heavily influenced by the US-based United Fruit Company during the first half of the 20th century.
The Venezuelan people “are entirely at the whims of whatever the US government, by way of these companies, is going to give to them,” he told Bloomberg. “Venezuela is a client state now.”
Both Rodriguez, the economist, and Robinson questioned whether the deal would survive a change in Venezuela's government.
“If I were an investor in Venezuela right now, I would be asking myself if there’s going to be a government in the future that will repudiate the contracts,” Rodriguez told Bloomberg.
Robinson, meanwhile, wrote on social media, "It's obvious that a democratic Venezuela would never hand over its oil to the US, so the US actually strongly opposes democracy in Venezuela."
Other experts pointed out that Trump lied about how the Strategic Petroleum Preserve (SPR) was depleted in the first place. While President Joe Biden did drawn upon the reserve in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Trump has also relied on reserves to offset the impact of his war on Iran and the subsequent closure of the Strait of Hormuz. As of August 21, the SPR held 289.7 million barrels, a 30% decrease from the start of the year, according to the Energy Information Administration. It is supposed to fall further to 243 million barrels per Trump's orders, Drop Site News reported.
"No one told the demented jerk that he drained over 100 million barrels from the Strategic Reserves?" Dean Baker, senior economist at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, asked on social media.
It is also unclear how quickly any Venezuelan oil could top out the SPR, given that Venezuela's oil industry has been weakened by sanctions and mismanagement and needs substantial investment and work before it can increase production, according to Reuters.
At the same time, Drop Site pointed out that Delcy Rodriguez made no mention of gifting the US oil when she laid out more details of the deal on Saturday night. According to the acting Venezuelan leader, the deal would last 25 years and the country would maintain “ownership of and sovereignty” over the oil “while leveraging capital, technology, and operational expertise to support the recovery of a strategic industry that has been severely affected by sanctions," as Reuters reported.
In response, Francisco Rodriquez outlined a series of questions about the deal, including how Delcy Rodriguez's remarks compared with Trump's.
"President Trump has also said that with immediate effect, the United States' strategic oil reserve will begin to be supplied through a gift from Venezuela. Can you explain under what conditions this gift is being made?" the economist asked the Venezuelan leader on social media on Sunday. "Which articles of the law or Constitution allow you to give away Venezuelan oil property? And if that flow begins immediately, as President Trump says, does that mean it will be supplied from current production, and therefore imply lower revenues for the national treasury in the immediate term?"
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'One Big Military Theft': Trump Announces Deal for US Control of Venezuelan Oil Fields
"This is proof Trump put our service members at risk to get Venezuelan oil for his billionaire buddies," one Democratic senator said. "Putting our soldiers’ lives on the line for private profit is a gross dereliction of his constitutional duty."
Aug 29, 2026
President Donald Trump announced on Truth Social on Friday that his government had "secured majority US control" of Venezuelan oil reserves containing 65 billion barrels of oil.
The announcement followed on reporting from Axios that a deal was in the works, prompting criticisms that such a move would be "colonial" and calls for Congress to reject any such proposal.
"Let's be clear: This isn't a win," Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) wrote on social media in response to the announcement. "This is proof Trump put our service members at risk to get Venezuelan oil for his billionaire buddies. Putting our soldiers’ lives on the line for private profit is a gross dereliction of his constitutional duty."
When US forces invaded Caracas and kidnapped Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife First Combatant Cilia Fores on January 3, Trump's own words following the invasion confirmed suspicions that he acted largely to gain access to the country's oil.
"These are some of the largest crimes of our lifetimes."
“We’re going to get the oil flowing the way it should be,” he said in a press conference following the attack.
Friday's deal, which seems like an attempt to make good on that promise, was also announced by Secretary of State Marco Rubio and acting Venezuelan President Delcy Rodriguez, who provided more details.
According to Venezuelanalysis:
Rodríguez stated that the deal will involve private corporations developing 17 “strategic fields” with 65 billion barrels of proven reserves. She echoed Rubio’s $100 billion investment claim and pledged that the projects would yield $209 billion in tax revenues. According to the acting president, the announced agreement “ushers in a new era of growth and prosperity.”
However, economist Francisco Rodríguez, a senior research fellow at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, argued that the agreement was actually a bad deal for Venezuelans.
"President: According to your figures, this agreement will generate tax revenues of just $3.22 per barrel of Venezuelan oil. This represents 4.7% of the current price, and less than half of the royalty rate contemplated in concessions granted by Juan Vicente Gómez," he wrote on social media, addressing the current Venezuelan leader and referring to a Venezuelan dictator from the early 20th century.
Joseph Bouchard, a journalist and researcher who focuses on Latin America, agreed with Rodriguez's criticism of the deal, writing on social media that "Trump [was] 'generously' buying billions of barrels of Venezuelan oil at less than 5% its market price. He's stealing their oil for his own family and cronies' profit. Guessing this may be used as a chip to manipulate the midterms. These are some of the largest crimes of our lifetimes."
Francisco Rodriguez had earlier pointed out that the deal violated the Venezuelan Constitution, which holds that all minerals and hydrocarbons are “inalienable public domain," according to Venezuelanalysis. For the deal to go through, therefore, Venezula would have to alter its Constitution.
Former head of Human Rights Watch Kenneth Roth noted on social media that "senior Venezuelan officials, all fearing arrest, are hardly in a position to negotiate vigorously, making the whole thing seems like one big military theft."
On the plus side, no one has to argue whether the United States is imperialist anymore. https://t.co/nsb87JUARw
— Dean Baker (@DeanBaker13) August 29, 2026
Trump is under pressure to lower gas prices that have spiked due to the fallout of his war on Iran, which entered its sixth month on Friday, and promised in his announcement, "This Historic Transaction MORE THAN DOUBLES American Oil Reserves, greatly increases our Oil Supply, and will substantially lower Gas Prices for all Americans, long into the future."
However, The Associated Press pointed out: "A significant drop in US gas prices tied to the agreement should not be expected immediately. Experts have repeatedly warned that a substantial boost in Venezuelan oil production will not happen quickly as repairing and expanding infrastructure takes years and requires billions of dollars."
Exploiting Venezuela's oil reserves would also exacerbate the climate crisis, which just this summer intensified a deadly heatwave in Europe and is supercharging an El Niño that could contribute to a significant increase in food prices in 2026 and 2027.
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'Yet Another Trump Grift': Congress Called to Stop US Takeover of Venezuelan Oil Fields
"Handing over Venezuela's oil wealth to the US contravenes the Constitution and is not in the interest of the Venezuelan people—much more when it is done at gunpoint," said one analyst.
Aug 28, 2026
Trump administration officials are claiming that talks between US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the Venezuelan government regarding control of the country's oil fields will ultimately secure "America's energy future for generations to come"—but analysts on Friday called on lawmakers to halt President Donald Trump's "colonial" push to take over the reserves.
As Axios reported, officials including Rubio and Deputy White House Chief of Staff Stephen Miller have been involved in talks with Venezuelan acting President Delcy Rodriguez about taking an ownership stake in more than a dozen oil fields in the Orinoco Belt and Lake Maracaibo regions, which have about 90 billion barrels of oil reserves. In all, Venezuela's vast reserves—the world's largest—contain about 300 billion barrels.
The deal would double US oil reserves at a time when Americans have seen gas prices skyrocket and oil firms reap profits as a result of Trump's war on Iran and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz—events to which countries that have expanded renewable energy sources have proven far more resilient, according to data from JP Morgan Commodities research.
Despite that resilience, the Trump administration has reportedly approached the talks as a way to lock the US into generations of continued reliance on planet-heating oil extraction. According to Bloomberg, one deal under consideration is a 100-year lease on the oil fields.
Axios reported that in return for giving the US an ownership stake—something Trump began privately discussing before US forces invaded Venezuela and abducted President Nicolás Maduro in January—Venezuela "would benefit from private companies, including American firms, developing the fields and returning more oil revenue" to the South American country.
Tyler Slocum, director of Public Citizen's energy program, said that if the deal is finalized, "Trump will likely transfer operational control to US oil companies," which donated heavily to his campaign.
The proposed deal would open "the door to Trump’s typical bilateral transactional corruption" and bestow "lucrative opportunities for the oil companies he chooses to reward," said Slocum.
“In the nearly eight months since Trump’s illegal January 2026 Venezuelan invasion, the Trump administration has managed a $13 billion slush fund gleaned from its control over Venezuelan oil sales, with zero transparency, and little to no public oversight or accounting," Slocum continued. "The president has no authority to negotiate a deal where the federal government takes control over foreign oil production facilities, and Congress must intervene and put an end to Trump’s oil-fueled imperialism."
One opposition leader in Venezuela, where Energy Secretary Chris Wright is expected to travel next week to discuss increasing oil production by US companies, said the deals currently being discussed amount to "a land grab—a massive land grab."
Francisco Rodríguez, a senior research fellow at the Center for Economic and Policy Research and author of The Collapse of Venezuela, said the country's National Assembly "should deny authorization for this predatory deal."
Following Trump's invasion of Venezuela in January, energy historian and Eurasia Group analyst Gregory Brew told The Guardian, "US dominance over Venezuelan oil reserves allows the US to regard Venezuelan reserves as its own reserves: a source of oil from which the United States can draw and that nobody else has access to."
"I think that’s how the administration is conceiving of this—excluding China, excluding Russia, but I think also excluding other potential customers for Venezuelan oil,” Brew said. “It sounds colonial, because it is.”
The president's "effort to establish a South American kleptocracy is an outrage," said Slocum. "There’s been no improvement in human rights in Venezuela, so Trump’s move is further evidence that his illegal actions in Venezuela are all about controlling oil with no public accounting, transparency, or oversight. This is yet another Trump gift for Big Oil.”
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Venezuela: Don’t Blame the Victim
The solidarity movement must unite in the broadest alliance around the defense of national sovereignty and the right to self-determination, strongly opposing the farcical New York trial of Nicolás Maduro and Cilia Flores, demanding the lifting of all sanctions, and calling for the return of stolen assets.
Aug 14, 2026
“Nothing is easier than to be idealistic on behalf of others.”—Karl Marx, 1858
Under cover of night, the US military kidnapped the lawful Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife and National Assembly deputy Cilia Flores on January 3, 2026. Collateral damage included over 100 fatalities of civilians and Cuban and Venezuelan guards.
This unprovoked surprise attack flagrantly violated international law. The hegemon acted in full expectation that it could operate with impunity. Even the neighboring left-leaning governments of Brazil and Colombia offered only mild rebukes. Then Venezuelan Foreign Minister Yván Gil said, “We found ourselves alone.” That is the context in which subsequent developments need to be understood.
The egregious military action culminated a quarter of a century of US and allied (particularly Canada and the UK) machinations against Venezuela: asphyxiating sanctions, stolen assets, diplomatic isolation, cyberattacks, assassination attempts, mercenary invasions, and establishing an ersatz parallel government. For the two months preceding the invasion, the US navy blockaded oil shipments. Still the empire’s goal of regime change was not achieved.
The Revolution’s Resilience Compelled the US to Escalate
Washington and its allies failed to destroy Chavismo, the movement founded by Hugo Chávez and carried forward by his successor Nicolás Maduro. Venezuela did not collapse or degenerate into chaos after the decapitation. Domestic peace prevailed.
The US-backed and funded far-right opposition did not seize power, but found itself ever more marginalized and in disarray.
The Chavista leadership continued in a seamless constitutional succession with Vice President Delcy Rodríguez sworn in as acting president. The unity of the top command held firm, backed by the National Assembly and supreme court. Likewise, the civic-military union and the communes and grassroots Chavista institutions fully supported the government.
Notably, the core Chavista leadership, the military, Socialist Party, and communal formations have remained united under tremendous pressure—pressure designed to fracture that unifying accord.
Relying on its overwhelming military superiority, Washington made a Mafia-style offer you can’t refuse. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio called Rodríguez on that day of infamy and delivered an ultimatum to collaborate with the US or face the country’s military destruction and the murder of her and other leaders. Variations of this scenario are corroborated by both the corporate press and Chavista sources.
President Donald Trump explicitly threatened, “There is more where that came from.” The alternative was the devastation currently being rained down on Iran, a country with far greater military capacity. With US forces deployed throughout the region and off its coast, a military confrontation would have meant annihilation, including the destruction of the oil industry. Rodríguez did what any responsible leader would do given the existing options; she made a tactical retreat in the face of overwhelming force.
Venezuela did not surrender
All the Chavista state institutions and the powerful universe of grassroots organizations that sustain the revolution remain intact. Yet US imperialism, by having a gun pointed to the government’s head, is in a position to exert substantial coercion leading to unpalatable decisions, such as Alex Saab’s deportation.
These accommodations reflect pressures that those of us on the outside can only imagine. How the solidarity movement should respond is a central question.
Former Chávez official Sergio Rodríguez Gelfenstein describes the current negotiations as an exercise in essential national self-preservation. He observes, “What is at stake is the survival of the State and the republic, which if lost, would make the discussion on any other topic banal.” As former Venezuelan Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza said, “Everything is now negotiated,” with Washington obliged to be in daily give-and-take with Caracas.
Legislative reform had long been on Maduro’s agenda. However, revisions to laws governing the exploitation of hydrocarbons and hard minerals involved offering generous conditions to international capital in order to attract much-needed foreign investment (which Cuba is also doing).
The new amnesty law, another planned initiative, is a key instrument promoting reconciliation and denying extremist elements arguments to incite violence. The law strictly excludes “anyone who has committed war crimes, human rights violations, homicide, drug trafficking, or treason.”
The government is in negotiations with the moderate opposition. Such successive rounds of dialogue were a recurring feature of the Maduro presidency.
Rodríguez has counseled prudence and strategic patience. Notably, the core Chavista leadership, the military, Socialist Party, and communal formations have remained united under tremendous pressure—pressure designed to fracture that unifying accord.
Long-Sought Gains Achieved
The US has reversed itself and in practice recognizes the Venezuelan government as legitimate. The Bolivarian project has not only persisted but forced its greatest adversary to come to some accommodation.
Not since 2019 had the US allowed transactions with Venezuela’s central bank and major state banks. US restrictions had previously cut Venezuela off from the global financial system, preventing access to dollar-denominated transactions and US financial channels. Oil sales to the US have resumed, with some revenues returning to the domestic economy. The US-dominated International Monetary Fund (IMF) is again engaged with Venezuela. Rodríguez has stated that Venezuela is not seeking IMF loans, but access to its own frozen funds.
As a Venezuelan activist friend said, “You gringos tell us how to make our revolution when our problem is you have failed to make yours.”
Although sanctions largely remain in place, special licenses and a temporary easing of economic restrictions for earthquake relief have provided some breathing room for Venezuela’s besieged economy while also facilitating oil flows to the US. The concessions are limited and reversible, leaving the broader structure of US economic warfare intact. Still, the arrangement is preferable to the total oil blockade imposed immediately before the January 3 assault.
Rodríguez has repeatedly demanded that Venezuela be free of sanctions, while formally seeking the release of Venezuelan assets abroad to address the devastation caused by the earthquakes. She has even appealed to King Charles III for the return of 31 tons of Venezuelan gold held by the Bank of England.
Changed Political Landscape
The balance of forces confronting today’s Venezuelan leadership is substantially less favorable than under Chávez, so judging its compromises by an idealized Chávez-era standard is mistaken.
Some internationals invoke Chávez to discredit the current leadership. Overlooked is that during Chávez’s presidency, Venezuela sold oil almost exclusively to the US, when dependency was significant. Ignoring the changed context, infantile leftist claims are made that Chávez never compromised and that “one does not negotiate with the enemy,” forgetting the famous advice from Fidel Castro during the 2002 coup: “Don't immolate yourself, Hugo.”
Chávez governed during a commodities boom that provided the Bolivarian project with resources for material benefits markedly unavailable today under sanctions. The geopolitical context has shifted significantly since Chávez’s time, especially under the present “Donroe Doctrine.” Not since Maduro’s victory in July 2024 has a left-leaning candidate won in Latin America. The last seven presidential elections have been swept by the right. Until this broader reactionary trajectory is reversed, further retreats are likely.
The purpose and cumulative impact of the illegal unilateral coercive measures have been to erode public support for the government. Years of comprehensive sanctions—despite the 2021-2025 economic recovery following an approximately 75% GDP contraction—have left Venezuela in a vulnerable position. Currently the Venezuelan economy is operating at roughly 30% of its pre-sanctions level.
The Rodríguez government is trying to buy time to recover the economy, although the June 24 earthquakes dealt a terrible blow. According to the United Nations, direct physical damage is estimated at over $37 billion, representing over one-third of Venezuela’s gross domestic product.
Most Venezuelans want domestic peace and a return to prosperity, not a confrontation with the empire.
“Unity Is the Most Important Thing—Without It, Nothing Is Possible; With It, Everything Is Possible.”
Those were the words of Fidel Castro as he was organizing the Cuban Revolution in 1956. Most dangerous for the sister Bolivarian Revolution is the suggestion that the current leadership has betrayed the cause and that a truly leftist “third way” can be fostered to replace them. There have always been competing factions within the Bolivarian movement. But political choices must ultimately be resolved within Venezuela itself, without interference from internationals.
These “third way” analyses, rejecting both Caracas and Washington, typically fail to address what Venezuelans could realistically do at this historical juncture—long on what’s wrong but short on viable alternatives.
Venezuelans will determine their path without foreign interference, either right or left. Solidarity necessitates efforts to accompany and uplift, not dictate.
It was not so long ago that it was the likes of far-right María Corina Machado who highlighted “cracks and fissures within the Chavista ranks” and anticipated “the beginning of a social explosion” against the elected Venezuelan government. Now some solidarity activists are saying the same.
The “tragic essence” of left disunity in Bolivia should be a cautionary lesson of what could happen in Venezuela. The Chavista leadership is painfully aware of this, hence their vigorous effort to establish the broadest united front against US colonization. Rather than being traitors to the cause, the Rodríguezes and Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello represent the most militant Chavistas—fighters from the very inception of the revolution.
What Solidarity Requires
Constructive criticism and solidarity activism need not be counterposed. Dissident opinions are appropriate when contextualized and given as part of a collaborative effort to advance common goals—not as individualistic venting.
Some among the left have appointed themselves as guardians of the faith judging negatively from afar the very difficult and risky tactical retreat undertaken by the Bolivarian leadership, even though it prevented a suicidal military confrontation with US imperialism.
The international left’s angst and disappointment regarding Venezuela’s retreats is understandable. But the Global South is not about to fulfill the revolutionary aspirations of those living in the belly of the beast. That, it should be clear, is the task for people in the imperial core.
As a Venezuelan activist friend said, “You gringos tell us how to make our revolution when our problem is you have failed to make yours.”
Venezuelans will determine their path without foreign interference, either right or left. Solidarity necessitates efforts to accompany and uplift, not dictate. Internationals living in the US, Canada, and the UK need to place the primary focus on our own imperialists. All other contradictions are secondary.
The solidarity movement must unite in the broadest alliance around the defense of national sovereignty and the right to self-determination, strongly opposing the farcical New York trial of Nicolás Maduro and Cilia Flores, demanding the lifting of all sanctions, and calling for the return of stolen assets.
El pueblo unido jamás será vencido.
(A united people will never be defeated.
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Trump Admin Has Taken $13 Billion in Oil Wealth From Venezuela, But Congress Is 'In the Dark' About Where It Went
"The picture now coming into focus is that the intervention has been... little more than a pretext for extracting economic wealth that rightfully belongs to the people of Venezuela," said one economist.
Jul 23, 2026
Since President Donald Trump's operation in January to overthrow Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, the US has taken more than $13 billion in revenue from Venezuelan oil sales. But nobody, including Congress, is entirely sure where the money has gone.
The Financial Times, which reported the figure on Wednesday based on estimates of oil sales out of Venezuela since January, pointed out that the Trump administration has given vague and contradictory answers about who currently controls the revenues from the Latin American nation's largest export and source of wealth.
Trump said in the days after the US attack that Venezuela's oil wealth would be "controlled by me." At a rally on Wednesday, he boasted that the US "won in Venezuela" and had paid for the operation "many many times over" by "taking tremendous amounts of oil" from the country.
He added that "Venezuela is doing better than they've ever done before." But economic data from the country tells a very different story.
According to economist Francisco Rodríguez of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, in the first quarter of this year, Venezuela had just 2.5% growth in its gross domestic product—its worst in five years. This is despite the fact that its oil exports grew by 25% during the first quarter.
He said this was likely "because the US didn’t transfer to the Venezuelan government the totality of its increased oil revenues."
While the executive order signed by Trump in January describes the proceeds from oil sales as nominally belonging to Venezuela, they are being held in accounts controlled by the US Treasury Department. It prohibits Venezuela from independently withdrawing from the accounts without approval from the secretary of state, Marco Rubio.
At a Congressional hearing this week, Michael Kozak, a senior State Department official, acknowledged that "it's their money, but they have to get our permission" to receive it.
While the State Department has claimed that “billions of dollars have been disbursed to the Venezuelan economy” and that “financial monitoring is under way to ensure funds benefit the Venezuelan people," the FT found little evidence that this is the case.
A website set up by the Venezuelan government to track exports from US-run oil sales shows just a single transfer of $300 million in March.
The administration has made explicitly clear that it is using the oil revenues as a tool to exert leverage over Venezuelan policy. In January, Vice President JD Vance said that the administration would allow Venezuela to sell oil as long as its policies "serve America's national interest."
A senior US official told The New Yorker that the administration has authorized about $6 billion to be disbursed to the government of Venezuela's interim president, Delcy Rodríguez, though there was no indication it had actually been transferred or spent.
Francisco Rodríguez said that even if it was, this "leaves an obvious question: where are the remaining $7 billion?"
He speculated that some of it might have been paid directly to joint venture partners, but noted that this would only account for a "fraction" of the difference and said there could be "other more complex explanations, beyond the possibility that the US is simply sitting on the money."
However, he said, "what is becoming increasingly clear is that the main reason Venezuela's economic recovery has been so sluggish is that, while the country is generating more oil revenue, it is not collecting on it."
In April, Kozak said the administration would provide quarterly reports on where the funds have gone. But Democrats on the Foreign Affairs Committee said they had not received them.
The lack of transparency has drawn concern from members of both parties in Congress, which Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-Texas) said has been “kept in the dark.”
“Trump’s invasion of Venezuela has been about oil, power, and graft from the very beginning, with billions of dollars in Venezuelan oil revenue being controlled by the Trump administration without transparency or safeguards,” Castro told the Financial Times.
Even María Elvira Salazar (R-Fla.)—who promoted a Trump-led regime change effort in Venezuela by saying it would be a "field day" for US oil companies—has called for the administration to publicize reports on where the money is going.
The question of what has happened to Venezuela's wealth is made more urgent by the twin earthquakes the country suffered in June, which killed about 5,000 people, injured 17,000, and left 18,000 homeless, according to government figures.
A World Bank report released Thursday estimated that reconstruction could cost close to $50 billion.
The earthquake has been met with calls for the US to lift its harsh sanctions on Venezuela, which have cost the country tens, if not hundreds, of billions of dollars in lost revenue since 2015 and which advocates have said are further hobbling the nation’s recovery.
Trump ratcheted up these sanctions in the months leading up to his operation to overthrow Maduro, and many have remained in place following the earthquake.
The US has provided more than $386 million in earthquake-related assistance to Venezuela. But it's just a fraction of the oil wealth it appears to be holding.
Francisco Rodríguez said the apparent hoarding of Venezuela’s oil wealth does further damage to Trump’s claim that his intervention was meant to benefit its people, as well as the US.
“The bottom line is that this arrangement is not proving advantageous to Venezuelans,” Rodríguez said. "The picture now coming into focus is that the intervention has been, as its critics have long accused such actions of being, little more than a pretext for extracting economic wealth that rightfully belongs to the people of Venezuela."
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