Trump’s oil deal could scuttle Venezuelan democracy, opposition fears
Source: By NAHAL TOOSI, GISELLE RUHIYYIH EWING and BEN LEFEBVRE, Politico • Posted: Thursday, September 3, 2026
A U.S. official insisted the country would hold elections but wouldn’t give a timeline.
Critics of the Trump administration’s new oil deal with Caracas say it’ll only entrench the country’s current government, led by interim President Delcy Rodríguez.Ariana Cubillos/AP
A person familiar with the Trump administration’s discussions about Venezuela said that administration officials believe the oil deal has “at best” a “neutral impact” on the election process. The key question is whether the Trump team has decided that Rodríguez should serve out Maduro’s unfairly obtained term.
If Venezuela wants to have an election next year, preparation needs to start happening now, the person said. But Trump administration officials, for the most part, are indicating “there’s no rush.”
The Venezuelan political operative, who has connections to the Trump team, said they have heard people close to the administration talk about an election time frame that ranges from 2028 to 2030. Had Venezuela’s 2024 election gone smoothly, the country would have held its next presidential election in 2030 anyway. And simply holding a vote is not enough, stressed opposition leaders. It has to be free and fair, unlike the 2024 race alleged to have been rigged in favor of Maduro.
Under the oil deal, the United States would receive a 35 percent stake in Betancourt’s oil company North American Blue Energy Partners to drill for oil in Venezuela, the latest instance of the Trump administration taking shares in a private business. As part of the deal, the U.S. would have “preferential access” to 20 percent of the oil the company produces at cost.
Under socialist rule in recent decades, Venezuela nationalized foreign oil assets, but the move, along with corruption in the public sector, contributed to the country’s economic decline. Many in the opposition today support capitalism and privatization in principle, but they say implementation and details matter.
David Smolansky, a spokesperson for Venezuela’s most prominent opposition leader, María Corina Machado, stressed, “To have a deal last in the long term, you need to have legitimacy, democracy and the rule of law.”
In Washington, former officials, researchers and some lawmakers working on Venezuela issues warned that the deal could derail, or at least postpone, a democratic transition in the country.
“It really does help the regime consolidate its position as Delcy becomes an integral part of the deal moving forward,” said Frank Mora, who served as U.S. ambassador to the Organization of American States during the Biden administration.
“To protect this absolutely corrupt deal, the people who are promoting it, including [Secretary of State] Marco Rubio, will likely find reasons to postpone an election in Venezuela,” predicted Pedro Burelli, a former member of the executive board of the state-owned Petróleos de Venezuela and an opposition activist.
Interim President Delcy Rodríguez and her brother, Jorge, another top regime player, are believed to have strong ties to the Venezuelan head of the oil company, Alejandro Betancourt, who has long been dogged by corruption accusations.
The initial planning included Betancourt, Rubio and Rodríguez, a person familiar with the discussions said, confirming earlier reports.
While the Trump administration has said that elections will ultimately follow its ouster of former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in early January, it has yet to give a timeline for that vote. Venezuelan leaders have said that the country is not ready to hold presidential elections, especially after two devastating earthquakes in July.
The White House on Tuesday rejected the idea that the deal would delay a return to democracy in Venezuela.
“This in no way impedes the democratic transition that needs to happen,” a U.S. official told reporters in a briefing. The official insisted that “the deal is not with the interim government. The deal is with a private entity that’s based abroad.”
But while the official said elections need to take place in Venezuela sooner rather than later, they avoided specifics. “I’m not going to give you a timeline,” they said, arguing that it would impose an “artificial time frame.”