SUBSTACK (The Grayzone) - Iran war described as 'biggest opportunity' at US oil lobby’s DC summit
But an attendee told The Grayzone that oil industry heavyweights were less excited about Trump’s Venezuela policy, complaining in private about the President's push to reopen the country.
By Max Blumenthal When the American Petroleum Institute (API) gathered oil industry leaders and lobbyists for a “State of American Energy” summit on January 16, 2026, the geopolitical landscape seemed to be shifting dramatically in their favor. However, an attendee of the resource extraction cartel’s most important annual lobbying conference told The Grayzone that participants privately grumbled about President Donald Trump’s heavy-handed attempts to steer their agenda, particularly in Venezuela, where he has demanded they immediately restart operations. Two weeks before the API summit, the US military kidnapped Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro in a violent raid, enabling the Trump administration to commandeer the country’s…Open