But the Trump administration has floated another explanation for its act of war — one that is both crasser and, on its face, more plausible: The White House wanted US fossil fuel companies to get a piece of Venezuela’s oil reserves. Speaking to the press Saturday, Trump announced that “very large United States oil companies” were going to fix Venezuela’s “badly broken oil infrastructure” and then start pumping “a tremendous amount of wealth out of the ground.” Some of this wealth would go to the Venezuelan people, in Trump’s telling, some to the US as “reimbursement” for Maduro’s crimes against America. In this context, Trump’s official plans for Venezuela’s oil sector would be a headache (if not a disaster) for most of America’s fossil fuel industry: Were Venezuela to drastically increase its oil exports, that would further depress global prices, potentially putting many embattled frackers out of business.
Author: Eric Levitz
Published at: 2026-01-04 21:33:34
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