President Trump announced early Friday he was calling off an “expected second wave” of attacks on Venezuela after the South American country announced it would begin releasing political prisoners less than a week after US special forces captured Venezuela President Nicolas Maduro.
“Venezuela is releasing large numbers of political prisoners as a sign of ‘Seeking Peace,’” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “This is a very important and smart gesture.”
Trump, 79, went on to say that Washington and Caracas are “working well together, especially as it pertains to rebuilding, in a much bigger, better, and more modern form, their oil and gas infrastructure.”
“Because of this cooperation, I have cancelled the previously expected second Wave of Attacks, which looks like it will not be needed, however, all ships will stay in place for safety and security purposes.”
The president also claimed at least $100 billion will be invested by “BIG OIL” in getting Venezuela’s energy production up to speed.
Trump is due to meet Friday afternoon with executives from companies including Chevron, ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips at the White House to make his case for why they should bet on Venezuela despite more than two decades of left-wing authoritarian leadership and ongoing instability and violence.
On Tuesday, the president announced that Venezuela would sell up to 50 million barrels of oil to the US at “market price” — and that he would control what the South American nation can do with the proceeds from the sale.
“Everything we’ve wanted, they’ve given us,” Trump told Fox News host Sean Hannity Thursday night about his relations with the interim government, led by Maduro’s former underling, Delcy Rodriguez.
“We’re taking billions and billions of dollars worth of oil, and it’ll be hundreds of billions of dollars. It’ll be trillions of dollars,” the president predicted.
“But we’re going to be there until we straighten out the country. We’ll see how the country is doing. But we’ll be running the oil.”
Maduro, 63, and his wife, Cilia Flores, were captured early on Jan. 3 by members of the US Army’s elite Delta Force and taken from their fortified compound in Caracas to New York to face federal drug trafficking and weapons charges.
On Thursday, Venezuela announced multiple high-profile political prisoners, including opposition leaders, activists and journalists, were being released in a goodwill gesture to the US.
“Consider this a gesture by the Bolivarian (Venezuelan) government, which is broadly intended to seek peace,” said Jorge Rodriguez, Delcy’s brother and the head of Venezuela’s National Assembly.
Prisoner advocacy group Foro Penal announced that opposition leader Biagio Pilieri and Enrique Márquez, a former electoral authority and anti-Maduro candidate in the 2024 presidential election, were both released on Thursday along with five Spanish citizens, including a Venezuelan-Spanish human rights laywer.
Meanwhile, exiled Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado is expected to meet with Trump next week.
“She’s a very nice person,” Trump told Hannity Thursday night. “I understand she’s coming in next week sometime, and I look forward to saying hello to her and I’ve heard that she wants to do that. That would be a great honor.”
Trump has declined to support a possible Machado-run government, telling The Post on Sunday that he did not think she currently has enough support inside Venezuela
Machado, was awarded the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize in October for her decades-long struggle against authoritarianism in her home country.
She has since signaled a willingness to personally give her prize to the president, who received several public nominations for the award.
With Post wires
