Oil Companies Ramped Up Their White House Lobbying on Venezuela Before Maduro’s Capture

In the year leading up to President Donald Trump’s ousting of Nicolás Maduro, four U.S. oil and gas companies lobbied the White House specifically on Venezuela energy issues — a marked increase compared to past years, according to a NOTUS review of federal lobbying disclosures.

Chevron, the only U.S. oil company currently operating in Venezuela, and Shell’s U.S. subsidiary, which has gas interests off Venezuela’s coast, have both been lobbying the White House on issues specific to Venezuela for years.

But shortly after Trump took office last year, two U.S.-based oil refiners who stand to benefit from an influx of Venezuelan crude joined the White House lobbying effort on the issue for the first time: PBF, a mid-sized refinery company with facilities designed specifically to process the type of crude oil that comes from Venezuela, and Phillips 66, which owns two U.S. Gulf Coast refineries that are also set up to handle Venezuelan crude.

President Donald Trump speaks during a meeting with oil executives in the East Room of the White House, Friday, Jan. 9, 2026, in Washington, as Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio listen. Evan Vucci/AP

The four companies did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Chevron is the only company to register lobbying activity related to Venezuelan energy and sanctions during every quarter for the last decade. The multinational giant is also the only U.S.-based company to have maintained oil operations in Venezuela consistently for decades, even in recent years as the country’s energy infrastructure began collapsing under the pressure of U.S. sanctions.

Chevron’s stock price has increased about 11% in the last month.

Since Trump announced that he wanted U.S. oil and gas companies to spend billions of dollars on the Latin American country’s battered oil infrastructure, industry experts have wondered which companies might be willing to take the risks required for investments in the country — and if any companies had been pressuring the administration to take action.

Chevron, because of its ongoing presence in the country, is best positioned to ramp up operations at the lowest cost. It has already pledged some quick investments.

However, immediate interest from the remainder of the largest U.S. oil and gas producers has been tepid; ExxonMobil’s CEO Darren Woods went so far as to call the country “uninvestable” during a public meeting with Trump, who responded by threatening to cut ExxonMobil out of a future deal.

“President Trump has called on all oil companies to make unprecedented investments and take advantage of this generational opportunity to restore Venezuela’s oil infrastructure. That’s why nearly twenty oil companies came to the White House to meet with President Trump immediately after this announcement to discuss new opportunity in Venezuela,” said Taylor Rogers, a White House spokesperson, in response to questions from NOTUS about whether lobbying affected Trump’s decisions.

Shell’s lobbying on Venezuela, which has been ongoing since the second quarter of 2023, is not related to the country’s massive onshore oil reserves, but rather a large gas field off the coast that could be used to feed gas to liquefied natural gas facilities in the neighboring island nation of Trinidad and Tobago.

U.S. sanctions on Venezuela have prevented Shell from exploration and development of the Dragon gas field, but an easing of sanctions and shifting U.S. policy could eventually allow the company to advance the project.

Even more than Shell and Chevron, the U.S. refining industry is expected to be the first obvious winner as Trump directs Venezuelan crude to the United States for processing.

In 2025, none of the largest U.S. refiners, including Marathon Petroleum and ExxonMobil, reported lobbying activity on this specific issue.

However, PBF, the mid-sized refining company with facilities specifically designed to process heavy crude, last year began to record federal lobbying activity related to Venezuela for the first time in the company’s history.

PBF hired Blank Rome Government Relations, a D.C.-based firm the company has employed since 2017 to advocate on a range of oil and gas subjects, to lobby on this issue in the first and fourth quarters of 2025.

Since Maduro was captured on Jan. 3, PBF’s stock price has jumped about 20%.

Also shortly after Maduro’s capture, Phillips 66 CEO Mark Lashier said at an energy conference that the company could benefit from access to more Venezuelan crude, describing the possible influx as “constructive.”

During the first three quarters of 2025, Phillips 66 listed Venezuela as a lobbying target for the first time in its history. The company did not list Venezuela by name as part of its government lobbying efforts in the fourth quarter of 2025, and it did not respond to requests for comment about why that activity changed.

Since Maduro’s capture, the company’s stock price has increased by about 9%.