President Trump suggested Wednesday that the US will oversee Venezuela for at least a year following the Jan. 3 arrest of the South American country’s president, Nicolas Maduro, on federal drug and weapons charges.<\/b>
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President Trump suggested Wednesday that the US will oversee Venezuela for at least a year following the Jan. 3 arrest of the South American country\u2019s president, Nicolas Maduro, on federal drug and weapons charges.
\u201cWe will rebuild it in a very profitable way,\u201d Trump told the New York Times in a lengthy interview. \u201cWe\u2019re going to be using oil, and we\u2019re going to be taking oil. We\u2019re getting oil prices down, and we\u2019re going to be giving money to Venezuela, which they desperately need.\u201d
The president initially said \u201conly time will tell\u201d when asked how long the US will have a direct say in Venezuela\u2019s affairs, but when reporters suggested various periods of time up to a year, Trump admitted: \u201cI would say much longer.\u201d
Trump also did not say when new elections in Venezuela might take place after he endorsed Maduro\u2019s vice president, Delcy Rodr\u00edguez, as the head of the Caracas government rather than opposition leader Mar\u00eda Corina Machado.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio has insisted that such a vote happen as the final step in transitioning Venezuela out of 25 years of left-wing authoritarian domination that has sapped the country\u2019s wealth.
Trump did not say Wednesday whether he has spoken to Rodriguez since Maduro\u2019s arrest, but \u201cMarco speaks to her all the time.\u201d
\u201cI will tell you that we are in constant communication with her and the administration,\u201d the president said, adding that the current Venezuelan government is \u201cgiving us everything that we feel is necessary.\u201d
\u201cThey\u2019re treating us with great respect,\u201d Trump emphasized. \u201cAs you know, we\u2019re getting along very well with the administration that is there right now.\u201d
Earlier Wednesday, Energy Secretary Chris Wright said the US would \u201cindefinitely\u201d control sales of Venezuelan crude oil, explaining: \u201cInstead of the oil being blockaded, as it is right now, we\u2019re gonna let the oil flow \u2026 to United States refineries and around the world to bring better oil supplies, but have those sales done by the US government.\u201d
A day earlier, Trump had vowed that Venezuela\u2019s authorities would hand over between 30 million and 50 million barrels of sanctioned oil to the US and that he had directed Wright to execute the sale.Here\u2019s the latest on Nicol\u00e1s Maduro\u2019s capture:
Trump added the crude would be shipped to the US, sold at market prices and placed under American control to be used for what he described as the benefit of both countries.
In an interview with NBC News Monday, Trump suggested it could take 18 months for the US petroleum industry to get production operations in Venezuela fully up and running, adding: \u201cI think we can do it in less time than that, but it\u2019ll be a lot of money.
\u201cA tremendous amount of money will have to be spent, and the oil companies will spend it, and then they\u2019ll get reimbursed by us or through revenue,\u201d he said.
The president is expected to meet with executives from Chevron, Exxon Mobil and ConocoPhillips to discuss potential investments, though analysts have cautioned that the scale and cost of reviving Venezuela\u2019s oil industry and infrastructure after years of neglect are likely to make the White House project a hard sell.<\/p>\n