U.S.-Venezuela relations

Wright arrived in Caracas on Wednesday and was meeting with acting President Delcy Rodríguez at the Miraflores palace. He plans a three-day trip that includes meetings with officials and oil executives. The U.S. Energy Department says he also visits oil fields tied to a U.S.-Venezuela energy deal.

President Donald Trump says he has informed Venezuelan leader Delcy Rodríguez that he’s going to be opening up all commercial airspace over Venezuela and Americans will soon be able to visit.

At his first Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing since U.S. forces seized Nicolás Maduro, Secretary of State Marco Rubio warns the U.S. could still use force to pressure Venezuela's government.

When the Trump administration sent in a team of U.S. special forces on Jan. 3, 2026, to extract Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro, the operation fell short of full-scale regime change. Despite years of U.S. antagonism toward Venezuela’s government, the broader political coalition that Maduro led was allowed to remain intact under the guidance of longtime Maduro ally Delcy Rodríguez.

To understand what’s happening and what it means for U.S. consumers and the American energy industry, The Conversation U.S. checked in with Amy Myers Jaffe, a research professor at New York University and senior fellow at Tufts University who studies global energy markets and the geopolitics of oil.

The United States and Venezuela are exploring the possibility of restoring diplomatic relations. On Friday, a delegation from the Trump administration arrived in Venezuela. The U.S. diplomats and their security detail are making a preliminary assessment about reopening the U.S. Embassy in Caracas.

Venezuela released a number of imprisoned high-profile opposition figures, activists and journalists, in what the government described as a gesture to "seek peace".

The "U.S. Hands Off Venezuela Coalition" wants the U.S. end threats of war and economic sanctions against Venezuela. They argue that Venezuela and all Latin American countries have rights to self-determination.

After returning to power, President Donald Trump halted and then changed the terms of Chevron’s operations in Venezuela, contending that it minimizes the company’s financial transfers to the country. Rather than funneling dollars into Venezuela directly, Chevron now hands part of the oil it produces to the Venezuelan government, which continues to own the oil fields.

The U.S. seizure of an oil tanker off the Venezuelan coast looks designed to further squeeze the economy of President Nicolás Maduro’s country. But what exactly is the Trump administraion’s aim in going after the tanker, and how could this impact the already beleaguered economy of Venezuela? The Conversation U.S. turned to Rice University’s Francisco J. Monaldi, an expert on Latin American energy policy, for answers.

Although President Donald Trump’s administration has been openly hostile to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro for months, there’s no sign Maduro has given up power as a result.