Trump imposes 25% tariff on countries buying Venezuelan oil, says regime sent gang to US

Antonio Maria Delgado, Miami Herald on Mar 24, 2025

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The United States will impose a 25% tariff on imports from any country that purchases oil products from Venezuela, President Donald Trump announced Monday, saying the move seeks to penalize Caracas’ socialist regime for deliberately sending tens of thousands of criminals to the United States.

Trump made the announcement on his Truth Social account, saying that the secondary tariff affecting Venezuela would be implemented “for numerous reasons, including the fact that Venezuela has purposefully and deceitfully sent to the United States, undercover, tens of thousands of high-level, and other, criminals, many of whom are murderers and people of a very violent nature.”

The upcoming tariff, to take effect April 2, may cause several international companies still operating in Venezuela to reconsider. These companies include Spain’s Repsol, Italy’s Eni, France’s Etablissements Maurel & Prom, and India’s Reliance Industries. Along with Texas-based Chevron, which is already withdrawing from the country, these companies account for approximately half of Venezuela’s 900,000 barrels-per-day oil production.

In making the announcement, Trump specifically pointed to the Tren de Aragua gang, which has been designated a Foreign Terrorist Organization.

“We are in the process of returning them to Venezuela,” Trump said. “These individuals, many of whom are convicted murderers or have engaged in violent crimes, pose a significant threat to American citizens.”

The president also cited Venezuela’s history of hostility towards the United States and the principles of freedom it upholds as a contributing factor to the decision. “Therefore, as a result of the new tariff, any country that purchases oil or gas from Venezuela will be subject to a 25% tariff on all trade conducted with the United States,” he said.

The tariffs could hinder Maduro’s current efforts to invite new foreign oil companies to operate in the country to counteract Trump’s previous decision to revoke the license that had been allowing Chevron to continue operating out of Venezuela despite the U.S. sanction imposed on the Caracas socialist regime.

Chevron was given until April 3 to leave Venezuela, but the date was extended on Monday to May 27. The other international companies were evaluating what to do next. Chevron’s production accounted for about 24% of Venezuela’s oil output, and its departure already represented a significant threat to Maduro’s plan to revitalize the industry.

Monday’s action kicks up the threat to a new level.

“These other companies, such as Repsol, Italy’s Eni, France’s Etablissements Maurel & Prom with this will really have no option but to leave Venezuela, because it will be no use for them to have access to Venezuelan oil if they are not allowed to sell it,” said Juan Fernández, former vice president of planning for the state-run Petróleos de Venezuela, PDVSA.

China, which is currently getting about 200,000 barrels per day of Venezuelan oil, mostly as payment for the huge debt the regime owes Beijing, will also have to reevaluate its commercial relationship with the South American country, Fernández said.

Venezuela’s oil production had significantly declined from its previous peak of 3.2 million barrels per day 25 years ago, to roughly 400,000 barrels per day in 2020. This decline has been attributed to the late President Hugo Chávez’s socialist revolution.

Antonio De La Cruz, director of the Washington-based think-tank Inter American Trends, said foreign oil companies contribute approximately $700 million to $800 million per month to Maduro’s government. He states that this revenue is essential for maintaining the military’s loyalty through corruption, financing repression to control the population and to launder illicit funds.

“That money is used to finance the corruption that keeps the military happy,” De La Cruz said. “It is also needed to finance the repression that keeps the population under control, but most valuable of all for Maduro, it is clean money that can be used to launder part of the money coming in from illicit sources.”

Maduro and his No. 2, Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello, have been accused by the U.S. justice system of heading the Soles drug cartel. The State Department current offers a $25 million reward for the capture of each man.

In his proclamation invoking wartime powers to expedite the deportation of Venezuelans believed to be members of Tren de Aragua on March 15, Trump claimed the gang is part of the cartel allegedly headed by Maduro and Cabello.

It “is perpetrating an invasion of and predatory incursion into the United States, which poses a substantial danger to the United States,” Trump said. “TdA operates in conjunction with Cártel de los Soles, the Nicolas Maduro regime-sponsored, narco-terrorism enterprise based in Venezuela, and commits brutal crimes, including murders, kidnappings, extortions, and human, drug, and weapons trafficking.”