President Donald Trump suggested on Tuesday that Venezuela could one day become the 51st state of the United States, as he showed off a tanker he said was carrying "one million barrels of oil" from the country.
Speaking at a campaign rally in Corpus Christi, Texas, Trump promoted a US oil agreement with Venezuela. The deal comes nine months after the US attacked the country in January and captured its long-serving leader, Nicolás Maduro. Trump says the agreement, struck with Venezuela's interim government, which his administration backs, will cover "billions" of barrels of oil.
"Venezuela will become a prosperous country, and who knows? Maybe some day soon it'll become a prosperous 51st state," Trump said from the podium. "That's possible." Venezuela joins a growing list of countries and territories the president has spoken of acquiring, among them Greenland, Canada and Mexico.
Pointing to the ship off the Texas coast, Trump said: "We're celebrating the greatest oil victory in history." He added that the oil was being provided to the United States "at zero cost to the American taxpayer."
Shortly before taking the stage, he wrote on his Truth Social platform: "By unleashing Energy Dominance from Alaska, all the way down to Venezuela, I have made the Western Hemisphere the Energy Capital of the World." In a separate social media post, he claimed US fuel prices, which have climbed sharply in recent months, "will soon come plummeting down."
The timing is politically significant. Tens of millions of Americans are due to vote in midterm elections next week, and opinion polls indicate that Trump's aggressive foreign policy has hurt his standing. That includes his controversial war on Iran and tariffs on goods from much of the world. His approval ratings have fallen to record lows, according to the polls. At the rally, the president sought to present the Venezuela operation as a success.
The urgency behind the oil deal traces back to the Iran war, which Trump entered in February. Gas prices have jumped nationwide since Iran closed the strait of Hormuz, a passageway for 20% of the world's oil supplies. The surge has added pressure to the cost of living for many Americans.
The agreement has also drawn skepticism. Critics complain that the Trump administration has not pushed for a transition to democracy in Venezuela, where no elections have been held since Maduro was detained by US forces. He was taken to New York to face criminal charges after a raid on his residence in Caracas.
