The White House has said that the Trump administration intends to seize the oil cargo aboard a tanker captured off the coast of Venezuela, escalating tensions with Caracas at a moment of sharp regional confrontation.
Spokesperson Karoline Leavitt defended the seizure, calling the vessel a "sanctioned shadow vessel" allegedly used to transport black-market oil tied to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
"The president is committed to stopping the illegal flow of drugs into our country. He’s also fully committed to effectuating this administration’s sanction policy. And that’s what you saw, and the world saw take place yesterday," she said.
Investigators are on board the tanker, interviewing the crew and collecting evidence.
The vessel is being taken to a US port, with the administration preparing legal proceedings to formally seize its cargo.
US Attorney General Pam Bondi said the FBI, Homeland Security Investigations and the Coast Guard, with Defence Department support, executed a federal seizure warrant for the tanker, which Washington alleges transported sanctioned oil from Venezuela and Iran.
Venezuela condemned the move as "a blatant act of theft and international piracy."
Foreign Minister Yvan Gil said the action, paired with recent remarks by President Donald Trump, demonstrated that Washington’s policy was part of "a deliberate plan to plunder our energy resources."
He said the real motive behind US pressure "has always been our natural wealth, our oil, our energy," adding that Venezuela would respond before "all existing international bodies."
Sanctions on Maduro’s nephews
The US on Thursday also imposed sanctions on three nephews of President Maduro — Franqui Flores, Carlos Flores and Efrain Campo — along with six firms accused of transporting Venezuelan oil.
The measures block access to any assets under US jurisdiction and bar US entities from doing business with them.
The sanctions deepen a long-running feud involving Maduro’s family; in 2022, Venezuela freed seven imprisoned Americans in exchange for the release of Flores and Campo, who had been jailed in the US on narcotics convictions.
