‘Trump, you magnificent bastard, I read your book!’

President Trump and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent are facing mounting criticism for creating a window for Russia to sell oil and gas to the global market via “narrowly tailored, short-term” sanction relief.  However, few people are putting the issue into context, and the background here is exceptionally interesting.

According to the terms announced by Secretary Bessent, the license to sell applies solely to Russian crude or petroleum products loaded onto vessels as of March 12 and is valid through midnight Washington time on April 11. [Treasury Notice Here – OFAC Technical Details Here]

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The sanction relief license to sell will be done in globally recognized petrodollars and applies only to preexisting oil and petroleum products that are already in transit at sea.  However, here’s where it gets very interesting and the ramifications are significant.

Immediately following the Alaska summit between Russian President Vladimir Putin and President Trump, Russia restarted Arctic-2 LNG terminals and began increasing oil production for storage on ‘floating platforms.’  President Trump met with Putin on August 15, 2025, and the curious increase in Russian production began on August 18, 2025.

In the past six months Russia has been pumping sanctioned oil and gas and storing it on ships and mobile sea platforms, seemingly (at the time) with no customers.  Suddenly, against the background of the Iran conflict, all of that previously stored ‘on the water‘ production, now worth double, is authorized for global sale (in petrodollars).

Either Russian President Putin is the luckiest guy in the world, or Russia knew something.

In 2025 what Russia did following the Alaska summit did not make sense; now it does and the ramifications are stunning.

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Energy Secretary Chris Wright appears on Face the Nation to push back against the narrative engineering of CBS’s Margaret Brennan.  The video and transcript are below.

[Transcript] – MARGARET BRENNAN: We turn now to Energy Secretary Chris Wright, who joins us this morning from Denver. Good morning to you.

SECRETARY OF ENERGY CHRIS WRIGHT: Thanks for having me Margaret.

MARGARET BRENNAN: So 50,000 U.S. troops deployed, six Americans that we know of so far killed in action, civilians stranded. We look at our polling, Mr. Secretary, and we see that this is an unpopular war among the majority of Americans. More than half of them, 56% disapprove. When you speak to energy executives about the scope and duration of American involvement, what do you tell them? How long?

SEC. WRIGHT: I tell them that for 47 years, Iran is warg- waged war against the United States, and they’ve- throughout that 47 years, they’ve tried to undermine the energy development and energy infrastructure of all their neighbors, as they’re doing right now, and it’s time to put it to an end. So yes, we have a, we have a temporary period of elevated energy prices, but it will not be long. In the worst case, this is weeks, this is not months, and it leads to a much better place. It leads to an Iran that’s defanged, that can’t threaten its neighbors, can’t threaten American soldiers and can’t continue to drive up energy prices by making a mess of the Middle East. They can move to commerce, not conflict.

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[Full Backstory Here] – President Trump secured the border, began repatriation efforts, targeted narcotraffickers, confronted narco-terrorists, targeted Mexican drug cartel leadership, leveraged the DOJ to indict regional actors, pushed China out of control in the Panama Canal, took out Nicholas Maduro, took control of Venezuela oil production – both for the security of the U.S. and benefit of the Venezuelan people, removed the discounted oil benefit for China and reasserted stability in the Western hemisphere.

Then, with all that in place, he turned toward Iran…. but, proactively planned for a ‘Shield of the Americas Summit’ before the Iran operation began and scheduled it for today while Operation Epic Fury continues.  WATCH:

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Additional video of the arrival ceremony below.

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An interesting reaction from Beijing highlights an evaluation of risk from the lack of oil flowing from Iran.

According to most evaluated data, China was buying more than 80% of Iran’s shipped oil. That’s according to data from 2025 as analyzed by Kpler and published in January by Reuters.

Iranian oil always had limited buyers due to U.S. sanctions. However, China purchased on average 1.38 million barrels per day of Iranian oil last year, according to Kpler. That represented about 13.4% of the total 10.27 million bpd of oil it imported by sea.

With President Trump previously cutting of discounted oil from Venezuela, two things unfolded.  First, the Venezuela oil was no longer sold with non-petrodollar currencies; Venezuela oil is now being sold on the standard oil market.  Secondly, with the Venezuela oil disrupted China would become even more dependent on Iranian oil shipments if they wanted to retain the discounted rate.

How big is the financial difference?  According to Reuters, “Iranian Light crude has traded at around $8 to $10 a barrel below ICE Brent on a delivered basis to China since December.” … “That means Chinese refiners save about $8 to $10 a barrel if they buy Iranian Light rather than non-sanctioned oil.”

Additionally, as noted before Operation Epic Fury began, “Iran has a record amount of oil on the water, equivalent to around 50 days of output, as China has bought less because of sanctions and Tehran seeks to protect its supplies from the risk of U.S. strikes, Kpler said.”

Buying discounted oil from Venezuela, Iran and Russia resulted in billions of dollars saved by China.  The only production venue not currently disrupted would be purchases from Moscow.  This increases the dependency, but the purchase price may no longer carry any discounted value, at least not at the previous rate.

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During the State of the Union address, President Trump surprised the audience with the introduction of helicopter pilot Eric Slover who was severely wounded in his legs during the successful raid in Venezuela to capture Nicholas Maduro.

Chief Warrant Officer 5 Eric Slover was repeatedly struck in the leg and hip by hostile fire as he was preparing to land. As his helicopter approached the target area, Venezuelan defense systems opened fire, and Slover was struck four times in the leg. The Chinook was also hit, but still flyable.

So, he kept flying. “One bullet after another. He absorbed four agonizing shots, shredding his leg into numerous pieces,” President Trump noted. Despite his wounds, Slover brought the aircraft and his team back to safety. Slover maintained control of the aircraft despite his wounds, executed the insertion, and ensured his crew successfully executed their objectives. He then piloted the aircraft back to the USS Iwo Jima. Within three hours, another team of helicopters would exfiltrate the assault team.

Slover is still recovering from his wounds and was standing with the assistance of a walker when he received the award. A total of seven Americans were wounded in the operation.

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Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Chairman, Tom Cotton, outlines via his X account that he has reviewed the intelligence community whistleblower complaint being used in a ridiculous effort to impeach DNI Tulsi Gabbard and finds it “not credible.”

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The entire construct of this CIA-NIC ‘whistleblower’ operation is transparent.  We have outlined the basic parameters of the entire fiasco {GO DEEP}. The intelligence community/Lawfare operation is a replay of the 2019 intelligence community/Lawfare operation used to frame Donald Trump during the 2019 impeachment effort.

Even setting aside the insufferable politics of it all, our national enemies must be laughing at us and how easy it is to identify the background of the super-secret, classified and “highly sensitive” national security information regarding Venezuela that underpins the baseline for the CIA-NIC effort.

If a simple website can put it together, then certainly our enemies know our own intelligence community is leveraging the rules and regulations around CIA assets to frame domestic political lawfare operations.

It is stunningly embarrassing on a national level.

As a result, I have tried to inform SSCI Chairman Tom Cotton via X with the following message:

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The Intelligence Community Inspector General (ICIG) delivered the “read and return” intelligence report to congress that sits at the background of an anonymous whistleblower complaint against Director of National Intelligence, DNI Tulsi Gabbard. [CBS Story]  In addition to delivering the report, the ICIG also delivered a declassified letter outlining the framework of the backstory [SEE HERE].

I strongly urge people to take a few minutes and read both links above, particularly the pdf of the ICIG report that frames the complaint.  In essence, the same playbook the IC tried to create the impeachment narrative against President Trump (2019), they repeated against DNI Tulsi Gabbard.

Now, the story gets a little weedy, so at the risk of yet another subpoena for outlining highly classified intelligence information simply by using public sourcing information and strategic brain mapping to put dots together, the easiest way to explain what has happened is to tell the big picture story of it.

People opposed to President Trump inside the National Intelligence Council (NIC), which in 2025 was a sub-silo inside the CIA, wrote an analysis saying the Venezuela gang ‘Tren de Aragua” (TdA) was not officially affiliated with the Venezuela government. Therefore, when President Trump and Secretary Rubio defined TdA as an officially recognized terrorist group, the analysis was intended to separate the TdA violence from the official U.S. policy toward Venezuela.

[The NIC is the “federal agency” being described in the media reports. I suspect the report’s authors were Mike Collins and Maria Langan-Riekhof or close associates therein.]

The “highly classified” component to the analysis, the part that intentionally skewers the telling of the story, is almost certainly the sourcing for the NIC analysis.

Here I would estimate with 90%+ confidence, that a CIA asset within the Venezuela government was the source of the intelligence saying TdA is not officially aligned with the Venezuelan govt.  That CIA asset could be someone very close to former dictator Nicholas Maduro, or someone currently inside the transitional government.  That source makes the component to the NIC analysis “highly classified.”  [However, it also fulfills the goals and operational agenda of the people who want to weaponize the “whistleblower angle.]

Now, I want to break out a component here because it is directly related to the reason for anti-Trump IC to manufacture this official CIA-NIC analysis.  Remember, Judge James Boasberg’s argument against deporting TdA members was based on his refusal to accept the deportees were designated terrorists.  Venezuela would not take them back, so President Trump sent them to the maximum-security prison in El Salvador.

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President Trump and Secretary Rubio are walking carefully through a process to keep Venezuela stable and authentic to the true intents of the Venezuelan people.  Toward that end, both Trump and Rubio have been very careful with Maria Corina Machado, the exiled opposition leader who claims to be the legitimate voice of the people.

Machado is loved by the United Nations, the American leftists and DC control agents. However, to avoid Machado becoming Venezuela’s Zelenskyy, President Trump and Secretary Marco Rubio are working through a three-stage process that would culminate in secure national elections to coincide with Maria Machado’s return.  If she wins the hearts and minds, she will have legitimacy.

If you listen carefully to her phrases and omissions, you can clearly see where the trepidation from Trump and Rubio comes from.  There are a lot of platitudes and pretenses within Venezuelan politics.  Video and Transcript Below:

[TRANSCRIPT] – MARGARET BRENNAN: And we’re joined now by Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado, and it is amazing to see you here in person after so long.

MARÍA CORINA MACHADO: Likewise. Thank you very much.

MARGARET BRENNAN: You met with Secretary of State Marco Rubio this past week. He said the U.S. now does not intend to have any military action or presence inside Venezuela, except for maybe at a reopened embassy there. Is that a good idea to take that military pressure off when the Maduro regime is effectively still in place?

MACHADO: Well, first of all, I have to say that on behalf of the Venezuelan people, we’re very, very grateful to the American people, and the first hand- first and foremost, to President Trump, to the secretary of state, and also to your leaders in Congress. I mean, the- the degree of support and care that we’ve felt in this fight at this moment is enormous, and I think it is clear on the- on the behalf and well being of the American people, but also of the Venezuelan people, and I would say the whole hemisphere. I do not think that the pressure is being taken away. Actually, everything Delcy Rodríguez is currently doing is because she’s complying with instructions she’s getting from the United States, and important steps are being taken. So I think that the message has been delivered, and so far, we’re seeing the results in the actions taken by the regime, and also in the mood and energy that is growing within the Venezuelan population.

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Secretary of State Marco Rubio appears today before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to outline the current situation with U.S. policy toward Venezuela against the background of Nicholas Maduro being captured by the U.S. Dept of Justice.  In essence, Western Hemisphere policy.

The Senate has been fraught with anxiety over the Trump administration focusing on the American continent and strengthening the U.S. position in the region.  Stability in the Americas is against the interests of the corporate and banking benefactors who pay for control of Senate seats and use their influence therein.

Having come from the Senate, after fulfillment of his fourteen-year corporate obligations, Secretary of State Rubio acutely understands the voices behind those on the panel delivering the questions.  Rubio outlines the goals and objectives of the Venezuelan operation by speaking directly to the concerns of the banking and financial community; in addition, he answers the questions posed by the performance actors put in place by the corporate strategists.

Video is prompted to 14:33 to cut out the narrative engineered talking points from the chair and vice-chair. Secretary Rubio outlines the BIG PICTURE.  WATCH: 

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Energy Secretary Chris Wright appears on Face the Nation to discuss the current and future plans for oil production in Venezuela, while explaining how the current mechanism to sell the oil is operating.

[Transcript] – MARGARET BRENNAN: This morning, President Trump vowed that Venezuela now has the military protection of the US. This comes just one week after he said the US would run that country. Meanwhile, Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado is expected to travel to Washington to meet with President Trump this week. For his part, Mr. Trump and his team met with dozens of US oil executives late last week, urging them to commit $100 billion to boost oil production there. Joining us now to discuss it all is the United States Secretary of Energy, Chris Wright, good to have you here in person.

SECRETARY CHRIS WRIGHT: Thanks for having me, Margaret.

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