President Donald Trump said Thursday that the world’s largest oil companies had pledged to spend $100 billion to fulfill his promise of reviving Venezuela’s flagging oil sector, even as the White House scrambled to expand a Friday meeting with oil executives because of skepticism from the top oil majors.
“They are going to go in. They are going to rebuild the whole oil infrastructure. They are going to spend at least $100 billion,” Trump told Fox News’ Sean Hannity.
Trump’s remarks come ahead of a White House meeting Friday with a group of oil executives that Trump called “the biggest oil people in the world” during the Fox News interview. The “top 14” oil companies would be in attendance, he said.
A wide range of companies have expressed interest in investing in Venezuela, but the leading oil majors with experience working in the South American nation with massive oil reserves remain skeptical about returning because of uncertainty about its stability, POLITICO reported Thursday.
