Trump's Venezuelan Oil Deal Won't Lower US Gas Prices for Years

US President Donald Trump announced that his administration has reached an agreement to extract tens of billions of barrels of Venezuelan crude oil to replenish America's depleting strategic oil reserves and lower gas prices. The deal would give the US a stake in Venezuela's vast oil reserves by allowing the US government and a private operator to drill into untapped oil fields for 100 years.

According to Trump, the agreement was negotiated by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, and Venezuelan interim president Delcy Rodríguez. Under the deal, the US would contribute capital and technology needed to restore and develop Venezuela's oil assets in exchange for production, jobs, investment in infrastructure, increased revenue for the state, and productive linkages for the national industry.

However, experts say that the development and production of Venezuela's crude oil will take time. Tom Kloza, the chief energy adviser for Gulf Oil, stated that it 'won't result in cheaper gasoline, diesel or jet fuel prices over the next five days, five weeks or five months.' The average price of a gallon of regular gas is $4.03, according to GasBuddy, up more than $1 from the start of the Iran war.