Machado says he presented President Trump with Nobel Peace Prize medal
Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Colina Machado said she presented President Donald Trump with the Nobel Peace Prize medal during their meeting.
This story has been updated to correct the error.
WASHINGTON – Venezuelan opposition leader Marina Colina Machado held a courtesy lunch with President Donald Trump, but gained little more politically after the White House secured a $500 million deal for Venezuelan oil through ongoing talks with the country’s interim president, Delcy Rodriguez.
The administration is pushing ahead with the promised sale of Venezuelan oil through talks with Rodriguez, who served as vice president under Nicolás Maduro before being captured by the U.S. military in a surprise military operation in early January.
On January 15, the White House expressed satisfaction with former Vice President Rodríguez’s cooperation. Trump did not look forward to meeting with Machado and did not seek information from her that would speed up the timeline for leadership changes or democratic elections, a presidential spokesperson said.
After meeting with Trump, Machado also met with senators from both major political parties at the Capitol.
The White House has completed the first sale of Venezuelan oil since Maduro’s arrest in a deal worth $500 million, with other sales expected in the coming days and weeks, officials said. News of the agreement came hours after President Trump spoke by phone with Rodriguez for the first time on January 14. The news site Semaphore first reported this.
A portion of the proceeds from the sale will be held in a Qatari bank, three people familiar with the deal said.
The Trump administration also plans to give Chevron a license to expand in Venezuela, two sources told USA TODAY. Reuters first reported that the deal was in the works. Chevron has long been the only U.S. company with access to Venezuelan oil through a joint venture with the national oil company.
“President Trump’s team is fostering positive ongoing discussions with oil companies ready and willing to make unprecedented investments to restore Venezuela’s oil infrastructure,” White House Press Secretary Taylor Rogers said in a statement. The White House did not comment on whether any of the funds from the deal would be kept in Qatar.
Meanwhile, the United States is seizing tankers carrying oil for sale to other countries, including China, in an effort to stop oil sales that it does not approve of. Hours before President Trump met with Machado, the U.S. military seized a sixth tanker in the Caribbean.
Mr. Trump and Mr. Rodriguez exchanged rosy words about their meeting, with Mr. Rodriguez saying on the X show that the meeting was a “long and thorough” discussion that “was conducted within a framework of mutual respect.”
“We had a great conversation today. She’s a great person. I mean, she’s someone we’ve worked very well with,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on January 14.
The Trump administration has praised Rodriguez’s willingness to demolish Venezuela’s oil reserves, the world’s largest, in U.S. interests, unlike his predecessor Maduro, who was captured by U.S. forces along with his wife from a bunker in Caracas in the early hours of January 3.
Although President Trump does not rate Machado very highly, his party maintains that it will defeat Maduro in the 2024 election.
Hours after Maduro’s arrest, President Trump told reporters: “She’s a very fine woman, but she’s not respected in this country.”
Another point of tension between Machado and Trump is the Nobel Peace Prize, which Trump has long coveted and was awarded to Machado last year. Machado told reporters after the meeting that he presented Trump with the Nobel Peace Prize medal, but did not say whether Trump had accepted it.
International election observers said there was overwhelming evidence that Mr. Machado’s party won the 2024 election against Mr. Maduro, but Mr. Maduro has refused to relinquish power.
Machado implored his country to intervene and overthrow Maduro as President Trump sent thousands of troops and elite warships to the region ahead of the Jan. 3 attack. Mr. Machado argued in vain that he should be the one to lead the country because the United States had done just that.
“We are ready and willing to serve our people according to our mission,” he said in a Jan. 7 interview on CBS.
President Maduro and his wife, Celia Flores, are currently in a New York prison awaiting trial on U.S. drug trafficking and corruption charges brought during President Trump’s first term.
President Trump says US oil companies will ‘distribute oil’ to Venezuela
President Trump said that with Maduro removed, the United States would “run” Venezuela and “supply oil” to American companies that have long been cut off from access to the country’s vast government-controlled oil reserves.
At a White House meeting on January 9, President Trump said Maduro’s capture had cleared the way for him to try to lure more than a dozen executives from major U.S. oil companies into lucrative deals with Venezuela.
“We’re going to work with Venezuela, and we’re going to make decisions about which oil companies are going to come in and which oil companies are going to be allowed to come in,” Trump said at the meeting.
“American companies will have the opportunity to rebuild Venezuela’s decaying energy infrastructure and ultimately increase oil production to unprecedented levels.”
He added that Venezuela has already agreed to allow the United States to refine and sell up to 50 billion barrels of oil.
President Trump then threatened to bar ExxonMobil from the deal in development after ExxonMobil CEO Darren Woods said legal and commercial factors made Venezuelan oil “uninvestable.”
President Trump has also suggested that the United States may reimburse oil companies for their efforts to rebuild Venezuela’s oil infrastructure, a possibility that some Democrats have decried. Representative Mike Levin and Senator Jeff Merkley on January 13 introduced a bill in the House and Senate aimed at preventing tax dollars from being used to compensate oil companies operating in Venezuela.
Merkley said in a statement to USA TODAY that the recent $500 million oil sale “creates an untraceable pool of money that can be manipulated without meaningful Congressional oversight.”
“There is no reason to believe that this money will benefit democracy or the Venezuelan people,” he added.
Sen. Tim Kaine, who has led Congressional efforts to block the Trump administration’s intervention in Venezuela through the War Powers Resolution, said in a statement: “This oil sale reeks of corruption. Why are the proceeds going to a Qatari bank account? Which billionaires are profiting from President Trump’s absurd plan to ‘run’ Venezuela for years to come?”
press Mr. Machado to express support
Before Machado met with Trump, Uriel Epshteyn, chief executive officer of the nonprofit Renew Democracy Initiative, which runs programs to unite dissidents around the world, said public support for her was evidenced by vote counts from the last presidential election. It will be more difficult to demonstrate her influence with elites and military generals, he says.
“I think there’s certainly evidence that she has support from the lower echelons of the Venezuelan military, but it’s clear that she doesn’t have enough support from the upper echelons of the Venezuelan military,” said Epshtein, who works closely with the rebels.
One way to tell whether the talks with Machado were successful is whether the United States maintains sanctions on Venezuela, he said.
If the U.S. lifts sanctions, Epshteyn said, Trump will have determined that Rodriguez is “someone he can work with and that it’s OK to keep her in power.”
That would result in money flowing to the administration, he said. “And when the regime has more money, it can pay more to the military leaders, guarantee their loyalty and guarantee the stability of the regime,” he said.
If that happens, the Trump administration would be working with a government the US has long declared illegitimate, rather than the party that previously claimed the US won the 2024 election.
