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Trump issues another update day after capturing Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro
04th January, 2026 06:58 AM
Donald Trump has said the United States will effectively “run” Venezuela until a political transition is completed, while tapping into the country’s vast oil reserves to supply other nations.
Speaking to reporters hours after Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife were reportedly captured, Trump said major American oil companies would invest billions of dollars to repair what he described as Venezuela’s “badly broken infrastructure.
Venezuela holds the largest proven oil reserves in the world, and Trump claimed that any US occupation would “not cost a penny, arguing that expenses would be offset by revenue from oil production.
However, major American oil firms have yet to respond to the remarks publicly. At present, Chevron is the only US energy company still operating in Venezuela.
At the same time, a comprehensive US embargo on Venezuelan oil remains in force. While Trump has expressed a desire to get “oil flowing eventually, analysts caution that years of underinvestment and infrastructure decay mean this goal may take significant time to achieve.
“There are still many questions about the condition of Venezuela’s oil industry, but it will take tens of billions of dollars to turn it around,” said Peter McNally of research firm Third Bridge.
Despite these challenges, Trump reiterated his position, saying the US would “take back the oil that, frankly, we should have taken back a long time ago.
In response, a Chevron spokesperson said the company remains focused on employee safety and asset integrity, adding that it continues to operate in compliance with all applicable laws and regulations. Other industry giants, including ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips, have not yet outlined their positions.
Although the United States is the world’s largest oil producer, it primarily produces light crude oil. Many US refineries, particularly in Texas and Louisiana, are designed to process heavier crude, which is more expensive and complex to extract.
Upgrading refineries to handle light crude would cost billions of dollars, making imports of heavy oil essential. As a result, the US continues to import large volumes of crude despite its high domestic production.
This dependency helps explain Washington’s interest in Venezuela, which, alongside Canada and Russia, possesses some of the world’s largest reserves of heavy crude oil.
According to the Energy Institute, Venezuela holds about 17 per cent of global oil reserves, estimated at roughly 303 billion barrels. While the country produced as much as 3.5 million barrels per day in the 1970s, output fell to an average of just 1.1 million barrels per day last year, accounting for only one per cent of global production.
The US was once Venezuela’s largest oil customer, but sanctions have since shifted exports primarily to China. Corruption, chronic underfunding and sanctions have limited Venezuela’s ability to capitalise on its resources, unlike oil-rich Gulf states such as Saudi Arabia.
Most of Venezuela’s reserves are concentrated in the Orinoco Belt in the central parts of the country. The heavy crude found there is costly to extract but technically straightforward to produce, according to the US Energy Department.
