Venezuela under Delcy Rodríguez after Maduro's capture

Oil was at the center of the new relationship. The White House said the US would control sales of Venezuelan oil "indefinitely."^[15] In January, US forces seized at least seven sanctioned tankers linked to Venezuela, including a Russian-flagged ship whose seizure Russia condemned.^[16][17][18] They later boarded others in the Indian Ocean after tracking them from the Caribbean.^[19][20] The first sale of Venezuelan oil under US control, worth $500 million, was completed in mid-January, an administration official said.^[21] Trump signed an order shielding the oil revenue from court claims.^[22] He met oil executives at the White House seeking $100 billion in investment,^[23] and said he was inclined to keep ExxonMobil out after its chief executive voiced skepticism.^[24] At the end of January, Venezuelan lawmakers approved a law opening the oil sector to private and foreign companies, and Rodríguez signed it.^[25][4] The law reversed a tenet of the socialist movement that had ruled the country for more than two decades.^[4]

In late August, Trump announced an agreement under which the United States would take control of 65 billion barrels of Venezuela's oil reserves.^[7] The White House called it the biggest oil deal in history.^[26] Energy experts and lawyers questioned its legality and called for the contracts to be made public.^[27] ProPublica reported that the administration had committed the US to taking a large stake in a Venezuelan company, some of whose owners and investors were shielded from public view.^[28] The administration defended the deal as a way to push Chinese and Russian rivals out of oilfields in "our hemisphere."^[29] Chevron agreed to invest more than $7 billion over five years and more than double its production in the country, Reuters reported.^[26] Continental Resources, the company of the Trump donor Harold Hamm, signed a preliminary deal to drill in the Orinoco Belt.^[30] Experts also cast doubt on Venezuela's longtime claim to hold some 300 billion barrels of proven reserves, the oil judged recoverable.^[31]

Rodríguez's government also released political prisoners under US pressure. The releases began days after Maduro's capture, in what the government called a gesture "to seek peace," and included Americans.^[32][33] In February, opposition figure Juan Pablo Guanipa, an ally of Machado, was seized by armed men hours after being freed.^[34][35] Authorities said they would seek to put him under house arrest for allegedly violating his release terms.^[35] Later that month Rodríguez signed an amnesty law for people prosecuted or convicted for political reasons during 27 years of authoritarian rule.^[36][3] She had announced it in January, along with plans to close a notorious detention center.^[37] More than three dozen prisoners were freed in September after US-backed talks with the opposition, a rights group reported.^[38]

Relations with Washington were restored in stages. CIA Director John Ratcliffe met Rodríguez in Caracas in January.^[39] Rubio told senators of "good and decent progress," while warning of possible military action if Venezuela's new leaders strayed from US goals.^[40] Rodríguez said she had had "enough" of Washington's orders.^[41] US envoy Laura Dogu arrived to reopen the diplomatic mission, and in March the two countries agreed to restore diplomatic relations.^[42][5] The embassy in Caracas formally reopened at the end of that month.^[43] Trump reopened Venezuelan airspace to commercial travel, and the first direct US commercial flight in seven years landed in Caracas in April.^[44][45] The Treasury Department lifted sanctions on Rodríguez in April and on her brother, National Assembly President Jorge Rodríguez, in October.^[6][46] In May, Rodríguez rejected Trump's remark that he was "seriously considering" making Venezuela the 51st state.^[47] In July, The New York Times reported that Rubio effectively controlled the country's finances, natural resources and government from Washington.^[2] In September, Rodríguez met Trump in New York, the first meeting between a US president and a Venezuelan leader in more than a decade.^[48] In her first address to the UN General Assembly, she thanked him and promised elections, saying the people would decide the "right moment."^[49]

The question of elections remained open. US-backed talks between the government and a faction of the opposition began in August without Machado, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate.^[50] Sen. Ted Cruz called for elections to proceed "rapidly."^[51] Machado had been in exile in Panama since she was smuggled out of Venezuela in December 2025 to accept the prize.^[52] In September she said she would return and press for a new presidential election, and her team said she was then blocked from entering the country several times.^[52] On October 22, thousands marched in the first nationwide opposition protest in nearly two years, demanding an election date and the release of political prisoners.^[8] On October 25 Machado reappeared in Venezuela, as doubts grew about the country's democratic future and the role of the United States.^[9] Her Nobel Peace Prize and her presentation of it to Trump are followed in a separate arc. Rubio warned Machado that street protests would not bring democracy,^[53] and in November he met his Venezuelan counterpart as Washington pressed for progress on election preparations.^[54] Trump said Venezuela had given the United States 1 million barrels of oil as a "gift."^[55] On November 9, ExxonMobil signed a memorandum of understanding with Venezuela that could lead to its return almost two decades after it left,^[56] and a confidential KPMG report showed that the US government handled $12.26 billion from Venezuela's natural-resource exports in the first nine months of 2026.^[57]