Trump Team Split on Venezuela Policy Puts Chevron in Limbo
(Bloomberg) -- It took barely 24 hours this week for the Trump administration to execute its latest reversal on Venezuela, with the fate of a huge Chevron Corp. venture hanging in the balance as closed-door White House differences broke into the open.
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The whiplash was the latest sign of the administration’s internal tug of war over how much pressure to put on the regime of President Nicolás Maduro. Advocates of tightening the squeeze — led by Secretary of State Marco Rubio — were opposed by those seeking to ease the limits in order to win Venezuela’s cooperation on other issues like migration.
“The recent zig-zags in Venezuela policy have left investors, and frankly everyone else, with their heads spinning,” said Geoff Ramsey, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council in Washington. “The question is whether the administration can articulate these two approaches into a single, more cohesive ‘good cop, bad cop’ routine.”
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Earlier this week, it looked like the other camp, personified by Special Envoy Richard Grenell, had turned the tide with a deal to return a US Air Force veteran held by Venezuela. In return, he promised Caracas a 60-day extension of the sanctions waiver for the Chevron project.
“President Trump authorized that extension if we were able to get some progress, if we were able to build some confidence,” Grenell told Steve Bannon’s War Room podcast. “We were able to do that today. So that extension will be granted.”
Holders of Venezuelan bonds and those advocating for a lifting of sanctions welcomed the news. But members of the congressional delegation from Florida — where the Venezuela issue is a major electoral one — weren’t happy. They had leverage because the White House ended up needing all the Republican votes it could get to pass Trump’s big tax package in the House of Representatives.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/trump-team-split-venezuela-policy-144022979.html
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