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Interior Secretary Doug Burgum landed in Venezuela on Wednesday to begin talks about a potential rare earth minerals partnership, just weeks after the U.S. arrested former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.
FOX Business exclusively joined Burgum on the trip. President Donald Trump’s administration views Venezuela’s untapped resources as a potential alternative to relying on China for critical minerals, FOX Business has learned.
While in Venezuela, Burgum will also help expand the relationship between U.S. oil companies and the Venezuelan government. The secretary will meet with the current Venezuelan President Delcy Rodríguez to continue the growing relationship between the two countries.
Burgum is the first member of Trump’s Cabinet to leave the country since the U.S. launched Operation Epic Fury against Iran on Saturday.
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Burgum’s visit comes weeks after the Trump administration completed its first sale of Venezuelan oil, valued at $500 million.
The deal came after Trump announced interim authorities in Venezuela would be turning over between 30 million and 50 million barrels of sanctioned oil to the U.S., worth about $2.8 billion at current market prices.
Energy Secretary Chris Wright said the U.S. government would oversee the sale of the oil and proceeds would be deposited into accounts controlled by Washington.
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“President [Donald] Trump brokered a historic energy deal with Venezuela, immediately following the arrest of narcoterrorist Nicolás Maduro, that will benefit the American and Venezuelan people,” White House spokeswoman Taylor Rogers wrote in a statement to Fox News in February.
“President Trump’s team is facilitating positive, ongoing discussions with oil companies that are ready and willing to make unprecedented investments to restore Venezuela’s oil infrastructure,” she continued. “President Trump is protecting our Western Hemisphere from being taken advantage of by narcoterrorists, drug traffickers, and foreign adversaries.”
Venezuela holds more than 300 billion barrels of proven oil reserves, nearly quadruple those of the U.S.
Though the country in the late 1990s was capable of pumping about 3.5 million barrels a day, mismanagement, corruption and the rising cost of extraction caused production to fall to roughly 800,000 barrels a day, according to energy analytics firm Kpler.
Fox Business’ Ed Lawrence contributed to this report.
