Trump news at a glance: president pitches oil companies on major extractions in Venezuela

Key Highlights

• Venezuela’s oil reserves are reputedly the world’s largest. History from the past two decades has shown that foreign intervention can have an impact on a country’s oil output, but with mixed and unstable results. Trump promises oil companies ‘total safety’ in Venezuela as he urges them to invest billionsWhile Venezuela’s oil industry experienced a boom in the late 90s and early 2000s, the then Venezuelan president, Hugo Chávez, reasserted state control over the industry in the mid-2000s.
• In the years since, oil production in the country has fallen drastically as its infrastructure has aged and investment dried up.“We’re going to be extracting numbers in terms of oil like few people have seen,” Trump said on Friday, emphasizing that the US stands to benefit from lower energy prices.
• “Venezuela is going to be very successful, and the people of the United States are going to be big beneficiaries.”Read the full storyTrump threatens to intervene in Greenland ‘whether they like it or not’Speaking at a meeting with oil and gas executives at the White House, the US president justified his comments by saying: “If we don’t do it, Russia or China will take over Greenland.
• And we’re not going to have Russia or China as a neighbor.”He added: “So we’re going to be doing something with Greenland, either the nice way or the more difficult way.”Read the full storyMinneapolis mayor accuses federal authorities of ‘hiding facts’ in ICE killingJacob Frey, the Minnesota city’s Democratic mayor, criticized the Trump administration, speaking at a press conference two days after the Renee Nicole Good was killed in her car in a confrontation with federal officers amid protests and community scrutiny during an immigration crackdown. Donald Trump, JD Vance and Kristi Noem, the secretary at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the parent agency of ICE, swiftly accused Good of engaging in “domestic terrorism”, without providing evidence and before the official investigation was fully under way. Read the full storyUS forces seize another tanker in effort to control Venezuelan oilUS forces were seen in video footage that officials posted online landing on the ship’s deck as the vessel named Olina was seized in the Caribbean near Trinidad.
• It is the fifth interdiction of such ships in recent weeks, separately from the series of previous US operations since the start of the fall to strike suspected drug boats off the coast of Venezuela. Read the full storyDoge cuts cost US taxpayers $10bnThe Trump administration “wasted” $10bn on paid leave, or paying wo.