What’s behind the US deal to seize control of Venezuelan oil reserves?

The United States has announced that it has secured control of a substantial portion of Venezuela’s vast oil reserves, after President Donald Trump pledged to “take back” the South American country’s energy resources.

On Friday, Trump announced that his government and that of Venezuela’s interim President Delcy Rodriguez had reached a deal to give the US majority control over more than ۶۵ billion barrels’ worth of proven oil reserves.

Details remain unclear. But the deal will involve ۱۷ strategic oil fields in Venezuela. The US government has said it will partner with a private business to extract the fuel.

“The United States of America has just entered into an Agreement with the Country of Venezuela on, THE BIGGEST OIL DEAL IN WORLD HISTORY!” Trump wrote in a social media post celebrating the announcement.

What has been said so far, and what could the new deal mean for US-Venezuela relations? We answer those questions and more in this explainer.

How much oil is involved?

The deal reportedly involves ۶۵ billion barrels of Venezuelan oil reserves.

That amounts to roughly a fifth of Venezuela’s proven oil reserves. As of ۲۰۲۳, the US government estimates that Venezuela has ۳۰۳ billion barrels of oil reserves, the largest known deposit in the world.

Approximately ۱۷ percent of the world’s oil supply is estimated to be in the South American country.

But some analysts have questioned the ۶۵-billion-barrel total Trump announced. With no fixed terms released, there has been speculation that Trump may have made a splashy announcement to help jumpstart the US economy.

“The ۶۵ billion barrel number is a red herring and will have little relevance to any actual deals — the real relevant details of which are still almost entirely unknown,” oil market researcher Rory Johnston said in a social media post.

“It’s just a classic big number that Trump was sure to jump all over and will repeat ad nauseam going forward.”

How will this affect US oil supplies?

Trump has said that the deal “MORE THAN DOUBLES American Oil Reserves”.

Government estimates indicate that proven US oil reserves are declining, standing at approximately ۴۶ billion barrels by the end of ۲۰۲۴.

The US government also operates a Strategic Petroleum Reserve, an emergency supply of oil to help ensure steady domestic supplies.

But the emergency stockpile is shrinking, with only ۲۸۹.۷ million barrels in storage facilities designed to hold up to ۷۱۴ million barrels. Trump has indicated that Friday’s deal will help restore the US oil reserves, which have hit their lowest levels since ۱۹۸۲.

What led to this moment?

The year ۲۰۲۶ has seen dramatic changes for Venezuela and its relationship with the US.

Since ۲۰۱۳, the South American country had been led by socialist President Nicolas Maduro, whose tenure had been defined by a series of disputed elections and crackdowns on political dissent.

Trump and Maduro had repeatedly clashed, with Trump accusing the Venezuelan leader of sending drug-traffickers into the US, and Maduro accusing Trump of foreign interference in domestic politics.

Their conflict came to a head on January ۳. For weeks, US military vessels had been amassing off the shore of Venezuela, and during the early morning hours, Trump authorised an operation to abduct and imprison the Venezuelan leader.

Maduro now awaits trial on drug- and weapons-related charges in New York.

In the aftermath of the attack, Trump backed Maduro’s former vice president, Rodriguez, to lead the government in Caracas. She was sworn in shortly afterwards.

The Trump administration also announced that Washington would take control of Venezuela’s oil exports “indefinitely”.

Critics have pointed out that the Trump administration has pressured Rodriguez to comply with its demands. “If she doesn’t do what’s right, she is going to pay a very big price, probably bigger than Maduro,” Trump told The Atlantic magazine in January.

What are Trump’s claims to Venezuela’s oil?

Experts have denounced US intervention in Venezuela as illegal under international law.

But the Trump administration has made the claim to Venezuelan oil resources a key pillar in its involvement in the South American country.

In the lead-up to the January ۳ attack, Trump and his allies advanced an argument that Venezuela’s oil supplies belonged to the US, due to a history of early fuel exploration in the country.

They also denounced the Venezuelan government’s efforts to expropriate oil resources from private companies, as part of an effort to nationalise the fossil fuel industry.

In December, Trump announced a blockade around Venezuela to prevent the sale of oil, its largest export. As justification, he accused Venezuela of having “stolen oil fields” from the US.

His adviser, Stephen Miller, separately called the nationalisation of Venezuela’s oil industry “the largest recorded theft of American wealth and property”.

International law, however, gives countries “permanent sovereignty” over their resources, to protect them from unwanted foreign exploitation.

Why announce a deal now?

Friday marked the six-month anniversary of the US-Israel war on Iran.

Once the war began on February ۲۸, Iran closed the Strait of Hormuz to commercial traffic. Nearly one-fifth of the world’s oil and natural gas supply passed freely through the strait before the war.

The shutdown has resulted in a spike in global oil prices, including in the US, where voters will head to the polls in November for midterm elections.

The American Automobile Association (AAA) announced this week that it expects this month to be the most expensive August on record for petrol prices, with US consumers paying an average of more than $۴ a gallon (۳.۸ litres).

The dispute over the strategic waterway is ongoing, as is the war itself. Ongoing military actions have also strained US oil supplies.

How is the Trump administration framing the new oil deal?

Trump has repeatedly held up Venezuela, under Rodriguez’s leadership, as a model for how it would like to deal with foreign adversaries like Iran.

He has also touted Washington’s control over Venezuelan oil supplies as a boon for the US economy during the midterm election period.

“We’re doing great in Venezuela. We’re taking a lot of oil from Venezuela, and we’re getting along great with them,” Trump told supporters at a rally in Las Vegas this month.

He then claimed to have “paid for the war” against Venezuela “with what we’ve taken out” from the country.

“That’s the old-fashioned way, right? The old-fashioned way,” Trump told the crowd. “To the victor belong the spoils, right?”

In announcing Friday’s deal, Trump pledged that the resulting increase in the US oil supply “will substantially lower Gas Prices for all Americans”. The cost of living is expected to be a key issue in this year’s midterm races.

Separately, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, a foreign policy hawk, framed the oil deal as a victory for Trump’s America First platform.

“It demonstrates how President Trump’s bold foreign policy is driving America First wins: securing stable reserves and low-cost oil in our Hemisphere and lowering gas prices here at home,” Rubio wrote.

He also asserted the deal would be mutually beneficial to Venezuela. The agreement, he said, will increase the private investment needed for “the reconstruction of Venezuela’s economy”.

How has Delcy Rodriguez responded to the deal?

Rodriguez has likewise presented the deal as a win for her administration.

In a message on the social media platform Telegram, she called the agreement “historic” and said that it would have “a significant impact on our nation’s revival”.

“It will facilitate a significant flow of investment aimed at the recovery and reconstruction of strategic infrastructure for the development of our hydrocarbons industry,” Rodriguez wrote.

Venezuela has long struggled with an economic crisis that has caused shortages of basic supplies and spiralling inflation. Nearly ۸ million Venezuelans have left the country since ۲۰۱۴ due to political repression and economic concerns.

Critics have pointed to government corruption and mismanagement of state industries, including the oil and mining sectors, as one of the reasons for the economic decline. Another commonly cited reason is the impact of heavy US sanctions on the Venezuelan economy.

Since taking office as interim president, however, Rodriguez has led a campaign to increase private investment in Venezuela’s industries, at the behest of the Trump administration.

Her government has estimated that Friday’s deal will net $۲۰۹bn in taxes for Venezuela, plus $۱۰۰bn in investments.

How long will the deal last?

Media reports indicate that the Rodriguez government has given the Trump administration the right to use the oil reserves for ۱۰۰ years.

What are the criticisms?

Washington has a long record of intervention in Latin America, and Trump has sought to assert US dominance over the Western Hemisphere as part of a policy he calls the “Donroe Doctrine”.

Critics have depicted Friday’s arrangement as a bid to seize Venezuela’s resources, akin to what Western powers did during colonial times.

Shortly before the deal was announced, energy analyst Gregory Brew likened reports of the impending agreement to oil concessions sought by the British Empire in the early ۲۰th century.

“Such a thing is without precedent,” Brew wrote on social media. “The closest thing would be BP [British Petroleum] (back when it was majority owned by the UK govt) claiming ownership of Iraqi and Iranian oil reserves pre-WWII.”

Trump himself has embraced the colonial-era slogan “Manifest Destiny”, as part of his plan for a “growing nation” that “increases our wealth” and “expands our territory”.

Could the Venezuela model be applied elsewhere?

Trump has floated the possibility of claiming oil reserves in other parts of the world, too.

In ۲۰۱۱, long before he made his first successful bid for public office, Trump suggested that the US should use its military power to extract oil from other countries.

“I would take the oil,” Trump said of the US military intervention in Libya. That same year, he repeated the remark in reference to the US occupation of Iraq.

During his second term as president, Trump has voiced similar intentions towards Iran. In April, he posted on social media, “With a little more time, we can easily OPEN THE HORMUZ STRAIT, TAKE THE OIL, & MAKE A FORTUNE.” He has also proposed making the Strait of Hormuz a US territory.