Trump’s assistant: Venezuela’s oil belongs to the United States

According to Isna, White House Deputy Chief of Staff Steven Miller claimed that the United States “created the oil industry in Venezuela.”

Miller’s comments raise further questions about the Trump administration’s claim that drug trafficking is a major source of tension with Venezuela.

“The sweat, ingenuity and toil of Americans created Venezuela’s oil industry,” Miller, who serves as White House deputy chief of staff, wrote in a social media post. Its brutal expropriation was the largest recorded theft of American wealth and property. These looted assets were then used to finance terrorism and flood our streets with murderers, mercenaries and drugs!”

While American and British companies were involved in early oil discoveries in Venezuela, the fuel belongs to the Latin American country under the principle of permanent sovereignty over natural resources in international law.

Venezuela nationalized its oil sector in 1976 and placed it under the control of the state-owned company PDVSA.

Later, in 2007, the late leftist President Hugo Chávez nationalized the remaining foreign oil projects in Venezuela, effectively ousting US oil giants such as ConocoPhillips and ExxonMobil.

US companies mounted legal challenges to fight the expropriation process, and in 2014, a World Bank arbitration tribunal ordered Venezuela to pay ExxonMobil $1.6 billion. Legal proceedings are still ongoing.

The United States imposed sanctions on PDVSA in 2019, during Trump’s first term.

But since returning to power for a second term in January, Trump has stepped up his “maximum pressure” campaign against Venezuela.

Late Tuesday, Trump announced a blockade of Venezuelan oil tankers, describing them as “sanctioned.” In a social media post on the matter, Trump echoed Miller’s claims that Venezuelans stole oil from the United States. “Venezuela is completely surrounded by the largest naval fleet in South American history,” Trump wrote. “This fleet will get bigger and they will get a shock the likes of which they have never seen before – until they return to the United States of America all the oil, land and other assets they have already stolen from us.”

The blockade is part of Trump’s increasingly confrontational approach to Venezuela and its leftist president, Nicolas Maduro, who served as vice president under the late Chavez.

Last week, the US military – which has been amassing military assets near Venezuela – seized an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela, in what Caracas called “international piracy”.

Since September, the United States has also been bombing ships near the South American country in the Caribbean Sea that it says are drug boats, in a deadly campaign that many legal experts say violates domestic and international law.

On Tuesday, White House chief of staff Susie Wiles was quoted by Vanity Fair as saying that the U.S. boat attacks were aimed at toppling Venezuela’s president, who faces accusations of human rights abuses.

Wiles reportedly told the magazine that Trump “wants to keep blowing up boats until Maduro yells ‘uncle’.”

Another complaint that Trump and his aides have raised is the baseless claim that Maduro has deliberately sent criminals and gang members to the United States in recent years.

But Venezuela’s massive oil reserves — believed to be the world’s largest — have been particularly contentious.

On Wednesday, the Politico News outlet reported, citing unnamed sources, that the Trump administration has reached out to private oil companies to ask if they would be interested in returning to Venezuela if Maduro is ousted from power.

“There have been contacts with the industry about the potential to re-enter Venezuela,” an unnamed source told Politico. “But to be honest, with lower oil prices and more attractive oil fields globally, there is not much interest from the industry.”

However, María Corina Machado, the face of Venezuela’s opposition, has promised to privatize the country’s oil sector and open it up to investment if Maduro loses power. He received the Nobel Peace Prize earlier this year.

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