Trump and Rubio seal Venezuela oil deal covering 65 billion barrels across 17 fields
An oil partnership covering 17 strategic fields and more than 65 billion barrels in reserves forms the core of a U.S.-Venezuela energy agreement President Trump announced last week. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth negotiated the terms. Interim President Delcy Rodríguez confirmed them: a production target above 1.5 million barrels a day, more than $100 billion in private investment, and large fiscal flows to Venezuela.
Key takeaways
- President Trump announced a U.S.-Venezuela energy agreement centered on an oil partnership covering 17 strategic fields and more than 65 billion barrels in reserves.
- The deal targets production above 1.5 million barrels a day, more than $100 billion in private investment, and large fiscal flows to Venezuela.
- Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth negotiated the terms, which interim President Delcy Rodríguez confirmed.
- Hundreds of political prisoners have been released since Maduro's capture in January, though human-rights groups say hundreds remain behind bars.
- The deal's precise duration, legal foundation, and long-term enforceability remain unsettled, according to the administration.
An oil partnership covering 17 strategic fields and more than 65 billion barrels in reserves forms the core of a U.S.-Venezuela energy agreement President Trump announced last week. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth negotiated the terms. Interim President Delcy Rodríguez confirmed them: a production target above 1.5 million barrels a day, more than $100 billion in private investment, and large fiscal flows to Venezuela.
Maduro is gone. The reserves he once controlled financed discounted crude shipments to Cuba, covered payments on Russian arms, and serviced Chinese debt while Venezuelans fled the country. American companies built much of that industry in the twentieth century before Hugo Chávez nationalized it. The decades that followed produced mass exile, political prisoners, electrical blackouts, and the rise of criminal networks. The Tren de Aragua grew under the socialist regime and extended its operations across the Western Hemisphere during that period.
Hundreds of political prisoners have been released since Maduro's capture in January, an outcome years of sanctions-and-dialogue policy failed to produce. Human-rights groups still count hundreds behind bars. A Maduro ally has been separately deported to the United States over an alleged billion-dollar corruption scheme tied to oil and food programs.
Terms and objections
Rubio said after Maduro's capture that the United States would not occupy Venezuela but would apply pressure. He has described three overlapping phases: stabilization to prevent the country from collapsing into conflict, recovery to bring Western firms in on what the administration calls fair terms, and transition toward representative government. The deal's precise duration, legal foundation, and long-term enforceability remain unsettled, the administration acknowledged.
Critics on the left have labeled the agreement colonialism. Hard-line Chavistas call it betrayal. Parts of the Venezuelan opposition argue it lacks legitimacy because an interim government, rather than a democratically elected congress, signed it. Contracts could be ratified by a future democratic legislature, the administration said.
Venezuelans have been calling for formal dollarization after the bolivar collapsed under socialism. Oil proceeds must be fenced off from the old patronage machine and audited, Rubio has said. The socialist party led by Diosdado Cabello retains control of the courts. No electoral calendar has been announced.