U.S. forces seized a crude oil tanker off Venezuela's coast on Wednesday in an operation officials say is aimed at enforcing sanctions on Venezuelan oil sales. The vessel is accused of carrying sanctioned oil from Venezuela and Iran as part of an illicit shipping network supporting foreign terrorist organizations, according to Attorney General Pam Bondi and other U.S. officials.
Attorney General Pam Bondi on Wednesday released video footage showing U.S. personnel boarding and securing a crude oil tanker off Venezuela's coast, as part of what she described as a sanctions-enforcement operation.
In a statement posted online, Bondi said “the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Homeland Security Investigations, and the United States Coast Guard, with support from the Department of War, executed a seizure warrant for a crude oil tanker used to transport sanctioned oil from Venezuela and Iran.” She added that “for multiple years, the oil tanker has been sanctioned by the United States due to its involvement in an illicit oil shipping network supporting foreign terrorist organizations,” and said the seizure was carried out safely, with an investigation continuing alongside the Department of Homeland Security to prevent further transport of sanctioned oil, according to the Daily Wire’s report on her statement.
President Donald Trump confirmed the seizure during a roundtable discussion on Wednesday, after being asked about the incident by Daily Wire White House correspondent Mary Margaret Olohan. “An interesting day from the standpoint of news. As you probably know, we’ve just seized a tanker on the coast of Venezuela, a large tanker, very large — largest one ever seized, actually,” Trump said, according to the Daily Wire. He said the vessel was taken “for very good reasons” and, when pressed on what would happen to the oil aboard, responded, “We’ll keep it, I guess,” a remark also reported by outlets carrying the Associated Press account of the exchange.
The Associated Press and other outlets report that the seizure was led by the U.S. Coast Guard with support from the U.S. Navy, and that the operation was conducted under U.S. law-enforcement authority. U.S. officials have not publicly disclosed the tanker’s ownership, flag state or precise route, though Daily Wire reporting, citing Bondi’s statement, links the vessel to shipments of sanctioned oil originating in Venezuela and Iran.
The action comes amid an intensified pressure campaign by the Trump administration against Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro. Maduro has been charged with narcoterrorism in the United States, and the administration has described him as a major drug trafficker. According to the Daily Wire, U.S. authorities have offered a $50 million reward for information leading to Maduro’s arrest and have approved covert CIA operations aimed at disrupting drug activities tied to his government.
The tanker seizure also coincides with a broader U.S. military effort in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific Ocean, officially framed as a campaign against drug trafficking. Since September, U.S. forces have carried out a series of strikes that have destroyed more than 20 vessels, including boats and semi-submersible craft, that officials allege were carrying illicit drugs such as fentanyl and cocaine, the Daily Wire reports. Separate reporting by the Associated Press and other outlets notes that the deployment has given the United States its largest regional military presence in decades and has drawn scrutiny in Congress over the legality and scope of the strikes.
The operation directly targets Venezuela’s state-controlled oil sector, the country’s main source of hard-currency revenue through its state oil company, Petróleos de Venezuela S.A. (PDVSA). Locked out of much of the global oil market by U.S. sanctions, PDVSA sells a large share of its crude at steep discounts to buyers in China, and, according to U.S. officials and analysts cited by the Daily Wire and other outlets, has engaged in complex shipping arrangements involving so‑called “ghost tankers” and intermediaries to evade sanctions. Bondi’s statement ties the seized tanker to such an illicit network.
U.S.-based Chevron continues to operate in Venezuela under a waiver from the Treasury Department that allows the company to work with PDVSA on some projects. As reported by the Daily Wire, Chevron provides a portion of the oil it produces in Venezuela to the Venezuelan government as part of the terms for maintaining access, giving Maduro’s government a limited but important financial lifeline even as broader sanctions remain in place.
U.S. officials have presented the tanker seizure as part of a strategy to choke off revenue streams that they say sustain both Maduro’s government and allied militant organizations abroad. Human rights groups and some members of Congress, however, have raised questions more broadly about the humanitarian impact of sanctions and the legality of recent U.S. military operations in the region, even as details about this latest maritime seizure continue to emerge.