Published December 20, 2025
The U.S. Treasury announced new sanctions against several family members and associates of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, as the Trump administration ramps up pressure on Caracas and continues to build up U.S. troops on the Venezuelan border.
The sanctions announced Friday come as the U.S. military continues to carry out attacks on boats off the country’s coast that have left more than 100 people dead. The U.S. military also seized a Venezuelan oil tanker and placed a naval blockade on all ships arriving at or departing from Venezuelan ports that are under U.S. sanctions.
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U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced the new sanctions, saying in a statement that “President Maduro and his accomplices threaten peace and stability in the hemisphere.”
“The Trump administration will continue to target the networks that support its illegitimate dictatorship,” Bessent added.
The new sanctions target seven family members and associates of President Maduro’s nephew Malpica Flores and Panamanian businessman Ramon Carretero, who were also named in the previous U.S. sanctions on December 11, which also targeted six Venezuelan-flagged tankers and shipping companies.
Flores, one of Maduro’s three nephews by marriage and referred to by the U.S. Treasury as his “narco-nephew,” is wanted for his “repeated involvement in corruption at Venezuela’s state oil company Petroleos de Venezuela SA,” the Treasury Department said in a statement.
It was not immediately clear how Flores’ role at Venezuela’s state oil company was related to “leveraging the rogue narcostate of Nicolas Maduro’s regime,” and Bessent said in a statement that this was the reason for further sanctions against the president’s family and associates.
The United States claims its drug-trafficking efforts are the main reason for its military escalation in the region since September, including attacks on ships in the eastern Pacific and Caribbean, which international law experts say amount to extrajudicial killings.
Despite the Trump administration’s repeated references to drug trafficking, its actions and messages appear increasingly focused on Venezuela’s oil reserves, the world’s largest. The reserves have remained relatively untapped since the United States imposed sanctions on the country during the first Trump administration.
Homeland Security Advisor and Trump ally Stephen Miller said last week that Venezuela’s oil belongs to Washington.
“The sweat, ingenuity, and toil of Americans created Venezuela’s oil industry,” Miller argued in X, adding that “its tyrannical expropriation was the greatest theft of American wealth and property in history.”
U.S. sanctions, particularly those targeting Venezuela’s oil industry, have contributed to the country’s economic crisis and heightened dissatisfaction with President Maduro, who has ruled Venezuela since 2013.
Maduro accused the Trump administration of “fabricating a new forever war” aimed at “regime change” and seizing Venezuela’s vast oil reserves.
The European Union has also imposed targeted sanctions on Venezuela, which it renewed last week until 2027.
European sanctions, first introduced in 2017, include a ban on arms exports to Venezuela, as well as travel bans and asset freezes on individuals linked to state repression.
