The United States has seized a second oil tanker in Caribbean waters, with the U.S. Coast Guard stopping the vessel in international waters near Venezuela on Saturday, U.S. officials said.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem confirmed the operation in a social media post. She said the tanker was taken in a pre-dawn action supported by the Department of Defense and noted that its most recent port call was in Venezuela. Noem stated that the United States intends to keep pursuing shipments of sanctioned oil that it says are used to fund narco-terrorism in the region.
In a separate online statement, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth linked the move to President Donald Trump’s earlier warning that sanctioned oil tankers going to or leaving Venezuela could face a blockade. Hegseth said Trump has made clear that this blockade on sanctioned tankers, whether departing from or bound for Venezuela, will stay in place until President Nicolas Maduro’s government returns what he described as stolen American assets.
According to Kpler, a data firm that tracks transportation and logistics networks, the tanker seized on Saturday was not listed on sanctions registers maintained by the United States, the European Union, the United Kingdom or the United Nations. That sets it apart from an earlier action this month, when U.S. authorities moved against a vessel that had already been sanctioned.
On 10 December, an elite U.S. Coast Guard tactical team, working with U.S. Navy helicopters, boarded and seized the oil tanker The Skipper, which had been designated for its role in an illicit oil operation involving Venezuela. News agency Reuters was the first to report that the Coast Guard was taking a second vessel.
Trump later detailed his approach in a 16 December post on his social media platform, saying Venezuela was surrounded by a large naval presence that he described as unprecedented for South America and indicating that the deployment would expand further.
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro responded that Venezuela would continue its oil trade and argued that Trump’s goal was regime change. He insisted that such an outcome would not occur and said Venezuela would not become a colony of any other state.
