WASHINGTON – President Trump said the U.S. has taken the Venezuela oil aboard seven recently-seized tankers — but the location of the ships remains a mystery.
“I’m not allowed to tell you,” the president told The Post in an Oval Office interview on Friday. “But let’s put it this way, they don’t have any oil. We take the oil.”
Trump spoke seated from the Resolute Desk.
The Nobel Peace Prize, gifted to him by Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, sat behind him, still in its frame, leaned up against the base of a statue of a golden eagle.
Trump said he was still weighing where to hang it in the White House.
Meanwhile, he noted the oil from Venezuela is in American refineries being processed.
“The oil’s coming into the refineries in Houston, in various places.”
The US plans to sell up to 50 million barrels of Venezuelan oil at a market price.
“We are running the oil in Venezuela,” Trump said. “Venezuela is going to get some, and we’re going to get some. Then we have the big oil companies going in, and they’ll be taking so much oil that Venezuela will make more money than they’ve ever made before.”
Since the ouster of Venezuela President Nicolás Maduro in a surprise nighttime raid on Jan. 3, the Trump administration has sought to control the production, refining and global distribution of Venezuela’s crude.
The president met with oil company executives earlier this month to discuss investing $100 billion in Venezuela to repair and upgrade its oil industry.
Officials want to use the money from the seized tankers as part of the rebuilding efforts.
The president has suggested the US government would reimburse American oil companies for resuscitating Venezuela’s energy industry.
Trump told The Post he’s happy with interium President Delcy Rodríguez.
“We have a great relationship with the new president,” he said. “She’s been terrific.”
