The Trump administration’s highly unusual deal to develop Venezuela’s vast oil resources would have the U.S. government collaborate with an influential and polarizing Venezuelan businessman.
Under the deal that President Trump announced late Friday, the United States would work with Alejandro Betancourt López, whose family controls Venezuela’s second largest private oil producer, North American Blue Energy Partners, according to four people familiar with the arrangement.
The federal government is expected to back the development of a significant portion of Venezuela’s proven oil reserves through the Pentagon’s Office of Strategic Capital, while Mr. Betancourt’s company would lead operations, three of the people said. The deal covers 17 oil fields spread across Venezuela.
Venezuela’s president, Delcy Rodríguez, backed the deal, saying in a statement late Friday that it would have a “significant impact on our nation’s revival,” and generate more than $200 billion in tax revenue for the government.
Mr. Trump described the deal as giving the United States “majority control” over a large portion of the country’s reserves, though many of the details of the highly unorthodox arrangement remained unclear on Saturday afternoon and were expected to change as the project gets going.
The deal represents Mr. Trump’s most direct foray into Venezuela’s oil industry since he sent U.S. Special Forces in January to seize the country’s leader, Nicolás Maduro, and began working closely with his vice president, Ms. Rodríguez, who now runs the government.
For Mr. Trump, the deal advances his quest to reshape the global energy market and enhance America’s energy security, according to a person familiar with his thinking. Mr. Trump believes, the person said, that additional oil from Venezuela would reduce the market power that Middle Eastern countries have and would help stabilize energy prices, which have risen sharply since the United States and Israel started attacking Iran in February.
Any meaningful new production from Venezuela will take years to materialize. As a result, the effort will have little immediate impact on global commodity prices, which in turn determine what U.S. consumers pay at the pump.
Chevron, the second-largest U.S. oil company, is also in advanced talks to expand its production in Venezuela, which would further expand the U.S. sphere of influence, The New York Times has reported.
Venezuela’s proven oil reserves are among the largest in the world, but its energy industry has been decimated by mismanagement, corruption and U.S. sanctions. It produces a little more than one million barrels of oil a day, or about 1 percent of global production, roughly the same share as under Mr. Maduro.
In broad terms, the United States is expected to gain preferential access to cheap Venezuelan oil, a key objective of the Trump administration as it seeks greater influence over oil production in the Americas.
North American Blue Energy Partners, or NABEP, would benefit from the direct backing of the U.S. government, which would make it easier for the company to obtain financing and supplies amid continuing U.S. sanctions against the Venezuelan economy. Working with the Trump administration should also shield the company from the volatility of Venezuelan politics.
The State Department said through a U.S. official that the deal would effectively give the United States 55 percent of the joint venture’s output. Neither the White House nor the State Department answered specific questions on Mr. Betancourt’s role, his company or the structure of the deal.
In a statement to The Times, NABEP said it looked forward to working with the U.S. government to rebuild Venezuela’s energy industry but added that “it would be premature to comment on exactly what role our company will play.” Mr. Betancourt declined to be interviewed for this article.
Under the deal, the U.S. government would have the right to acquire shares in NABEP or a related entity through a financial instrument known as a warrant, according to two people familiar with the matter. A warrant allows its owner to buy shares in a company at a predetermined price. Warrants can be traded and can rise and fall in value based on the price of the shares of the company that issued them.
NABEP, which is based in Barbados, according to its website, produces around 200,000 barrels per day. The company plans to take up to $5 billion in debt to raise output to one million barrels in the next five years, according to a person close to the company.
Mr. Betancourt, 46, rose to prominence in the 2010s, when the Venezuelan government awarded him and his partners contracts to build numerous power plants across the country even though they had no experience doing that work. The deals earned the investors the moniker “bolichicos,” meaning the “Bolivarian boys,” a reference to the new cohort of businessmen who profited from the government so-called Bolivarian Revolution.
Mr. Betancourt later bought a stake in an oil company called Petrozamora that operated mature oil fields in Lake Maracaibo in western Venezuela. Those fields became the core of NABEP, which has since acquired new fields and raised it production significantly since 2024.
Mr. Betancourt’s personal bank accounts have been under investigation for more than a decade by prosecutors in Zurich, but he has not been formally charged in Switzerland.
“Mr. Betancourt has never been charged with a crime in any jurisdiction,” Sara Chouraqui, NABEP’s general counsel, said in a statement.
Since ousting Mr. Maduro in January, the Trump administration has been relying on Mr. Betancourt to help put together commercial ventures and partnerships in Venezuela, a person familiar with the U.S. government’s efforts said.
The Trump administration began looking into Mr. Betancourt last year, as it sought out partners who would help it advance U.S. interests after the removal of Mr. Maduro. Washington officials, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio, took a positive view of Mr. Betancourt’s record of raising oil production, a rare success story amid the malaise of the industry dominated by state-run oil fields. The operational track record made the Trump administration look past the allegations of corruption that have swirled around Mr. Betancourt for years, according to a person close to the administration.
This year, State Department officials tried to pressure the Swiss government to ease up on investigations into Mr. Betancourt and asked the British government to lift travel restrictions on him, said the person familiar with the U.S. government’s efforts. The department also gave Mr. Betancourt a multiple-entry visa to the United States so he could meet with Trump administration officials.
The Washington Post reported earlier on some details of the administration’s efforts to help Mr. Betancourt.
The Pentagon did not answer specific questions about how its Office of Strategic Capital would work with Mr. Betancourt’s company. The office “conducts extensive due diligence and comprehensive legal review of potential transactions to fulfill all applicable legal and regulatory requirements,” Kingsley Wilson, the Pentagon’s press secretary, said.
Julie Turkewitz and Simon Romero contributed reporting.
