2026年4月30日 / 美国东部时间下午6:01 / 哥伦比亚广播公司（CBS）新闻
美国特朗普政府官员搭乘了7年来首架往返美国与委内瑞拉的直飞商业航班，该航班于周四从迈阿密起飞，目的地为加拉加斯。
美国国家能源主导委员会的贾罗德·阿根率领美国代表团，委内瑞拉新任驻美大使费利克斯·普拉森西亚也搭乘了这趟美国航空的航班。
阿根在接受CBS新闻采访时表示，前往加拉加斯的白宫团队计划推动美国企业与委内瑞拉国家石油公司PDVSA以及部分矿业公司达成若干合作协议。由小罗斯·佩罗特支持的HKN能源公司和亨特能源公司是新近进入委内瑞拉市场的美国企业之一。阿根还表示，他预计也将会见委内瑞拉临时总统德尔西·罗德里格斯。
此次行程距美国特种部队发动突袭逮捕罗德里格斯的前任尼古拉斯·马杜罗及其妻子已近四个月。两人已被引渡至纽约，面临毒品贩运指控，目前均已不认罪。
自马杜罗被推翻以来，美国政府一直在寻求激励美国企业投资委内瑞拉石油 sector，放宽制裁以允许美国石油公司投资基础设施建设和生产。美国能源部长克里斯·赖特和内政部长道格·伯古姆也曾率领代表团访问委内瑞拉——这个国家拥有全球最大的石油储量。
“委内瑞拉的经济开放正处于高铁速度，而民主进程却像牛车一样缓慢，”前美国官员胡安·冈萨雷斯在结束加拉加斯商务行程返回后对CBS新闻如此表示。冈萨雷斯曾在拜登政府时期担任国务院西半球事务副助理国务卿。他称，在加拉加斯随处可见的马杜罗旧海报正被取下，而查韦斯主义——雨果·查韦斯和尼古拉斯·马杜罗的左翼社会主义意识形态——已经消亡。但就目前而言，马杜罗政权仍得以存续——只不过马杜罗本人已经倒台。
美国第二大能源企业雪佛龙一直在委内瑞拉持续运营，即便在马杜罗执政时期亦是如此。特朗普政府一直在敦促罗德里格斯政府进行监管改革，以吸引更多投资，稳定委内瑞拉经济。
在将于周日播出的《面对全国》节目采访中，雪佛龙首席执行官迈克·沃思表示，罗德里格斯在国家 hydrocarbon法律改革方面确实取得了进展，这些改革实质上调整了企业在委内瑞拉投资的条款。
“这项改革仍有完善空间，可能还不足以吸引我们期望的投资规模，”沃思对CBS新闻说道。他是在上周白宫会议前接受的采访。
委内瑞拉出产的原油属于重质原油，正好适配美国墨西哥湾沿岸的炼油厂加工需求。沃思表示，他支持改革委内瑞拉能源体系以提高该国能源产量，但称这仍是一项“进行中的工作”。沃思指出，雪佛龙在委内瑞拉保留了优秀的员工，但也承认，在过去二十年的查韦斯主义统治期间，该国一部分极具天赋的劳动力已经逃离了委内瑞拉。
沃思还告诉CBS新闻，他曾与美国国务卿马可·卢比奥交谈，卢比奥曾谈及委内瑞拉需要在适当时候举行选举。他并未透露民主过渡的具体时间表。美国已恢复在加拉加斯的外交存在，并任命职业外交官员约翰·巴雷特为临时代办。
特朗普政府对选举时间表一直守口如瓶。多名美国和委内瑞拉官员表示，该国可能需要两到三年时间才能做好选举准备。特朗普政府将稳定委内瑞拉作为首要任务，民主过渡则位居其次。罗德里格斯似乎计划完成马杜罗剩余的六年任期，这意味着选举可能会在2030年举行。
反对党领袖玛丽亚·科里娜·马查多在2月接受《面对全国》采访时表示，在流亡者感到足够安全愿意返回之前，需要制定一个明确且可靠的过渡时间表。她已至少两次与特朗普总统会面，最近还与卢比奥讨论了返回委内瑞拉的未来计划。她自信地对CBS新闻表示：“时机成熟时，我将成为总统。”
据国务院评估，马查多所在的政党赢得了2024年的总统选举，当时有1200万委内瑞拉人和平投票。尽管如此，由马杜罗控制的全国选举委员会宣布马杜罗获胜，马杜罗的支持者随后试图逮捕埃德蒙多·冈萨雷斯（他在选举中代替马查多参选）和马查多，美国方面称这是一场为保住权力的阴谋。
罗德里格斯曾是马杜罗的副总统，今年3月被特朗普政府正式承认为委内瑞拉“唯一国家元首”。而就在三个月前，美国军方发动闪电突袭，于1月逮捕了马杜罗，并以与“太阳卡特尔”相关的贩毒罪名将其关押在美国境内。
美国本月早些时候解除了对罗德里格斯的制裁，但内政部长迪奥斯达多·卡贝洛仍被美国政府悬赏2500万美元通缉，因其在“太阳卡特尔”中的角色——该组织正是美国认定的恐怖主义贩毒集团。卡贝洛曾掌管马杜罗的镇压性安全机构，但如今仍是委内瑞拉政府的关键人物。曾是马杜罗头号打手的卡贝洛，现在可以坐在高级特朗普政府官员对面，共同商讨商业合作协议。
Trump admin. officials fly on first direct commercial flight between US and Venezuela in 7 years
April 30, 2026 / 6:01 PM EDT / CBS News
Trump administration officials were on the first nonstop commercial flight between the U.S. and Venezuela in seven years when it took off Thursday from Miami, bound for Caracas.
National Energy Dominance Council’s Jarrod Agen led the U.S. team, and Venezuela’s newly appointed Ambassador to the U.S., Félix Plasencia, was also on board the American Airlines flight.
Agen told CBS News that a White House team traveling to Caracas plans to push along some agreements between U.S. companies and Venezuela’s state oil company PDVSA and some of its mining companies. HKN Energy, a company backed by Ross Perot Jr., as well as Hunt Energy, are among the new American entrants to the Venezuelan market. Agen expected to meet with interim Venezuelan President Delcy Rodríguez, too.
A ribbon is cut following the arrival of an American Eagle, operating a regional flight for American Airlines, aircraft at Simon Bolivar International Airport in La Guaira, La Guaira state, Venezuela on April 30, 2026. Federico PARRA /AFP via Getty Images
The trip comes nearly four months after U.S. forces seized Rodríguez’s predecessor, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife in a daring special forces raid. Both were extradited to New York to face drug trafficking charges and have since pleaded not guilty.
Since Maduro’s removal from power, the administration has sought to incentivize U.S. investment in Venezuela’s oil sector, rolling back sanctions to allow American oil companies to spend on infrastructure and production. Energy Secretary Chris Wright and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum have also led delegations to Venezuela, which holds the world’s largest oil reserves.
Flight information for American Airlines Flight 3599, operating from Miami International Airport to Caracas, Venezuela, on a nonstop flight to Venezuela, on April 30, 2026. CHANDAN KHANNA /AFP via Getty Images
“The economic opening in Venezuela is on a bullet train. The democratic process is on a chicken cart,” former U.S. official Juan Gonzalez told CBS News, upon returning from a business trip to Caracas. Gonzalez served as the State Department’s deputy assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere Affairs during the Biden administration. He said it was stunning to see the old posters of Maduro in Caracas being taken down and said Chavismo — the left-wing socialist ideology of Hugo Chávez and Nicolas Maduro — as dead and gone. But at this point, the Maduro regime remains intact — albeit minus Maduro himself.
Chevron, America’s second largest energy company, has continuously operated in Venezuela, including under the Maduro regime. The Trump administration has tried to urge the Rodríguez government to make regulatory changes to help usher in more investment to stabilize the country’s economy.
In an interview that will air on “Face the Nation” Sunday, Chevron CEO Mike Wirth said that progress has indeed been made by Rodríguez regarding changes to the country’s hydrocarbon laws, which effectively change the terms under which companies can invest in Venezuela.
“It still needs some work. It’s probably not enough to bring in the level of investment that would be desirable,” Wirth told CBS News. He spoke with CBS News before a meeting at the White House last week.
Venezuelan oil is the type of heavy crude that refineries along the Gulf Coast of the U.S. are designed to process. He said he supports changes to the system to increase energy production in Venezuela but described it as a “work in progress.” Wirth said Chevron maintains great employees in Venezuela but acknowledged that some of what he described as a very talented workforce had fled the country over the past two decades of Chavismo.
Wirth also told CBS News that he speaks to Secretary of State Marco Rubio and has heard him discuss the need to hold elections in due course in Venezuela. He did not share a timeline for that democratic transition. The U.S. has reestablished its diplomatic presence in Caracas and has appointed career foreign service officer John Barrett as chargé d’affaires.
The Trump administration has been tightlipped about the timeline for elections to be held. Multiple U.S. and Venezuelan officials indicated that it could be two to three years before the country is prepared for elections. The Trump administration has made stabilization of the country a top priority, with democracy a secondary goal. Rodríguez appears to be planning to finish out the remainder of Maduro’s six-year term, which could mean elections in 2030.
Opposition leader María Corina Machado told “Face the Nation” in February that a secure and precise timeline for a transition away from the Maduro regime is needed before exiles will feel safe enough to return. She has at least twice consulted with President Trump and recently with Rubio about her future plans to return to Venezuela. She confidently told CBS News that “I will be president when the time comes.”
Machado’s party won the last presidential election in 2024, according to the State Department, which assessed that 12 million Venezuelans peacefully went to the polls. Nonetheless, the Maduro-controlled National Electoral Council declared Maduro the winner, and his representatives then sought to arrest Edmundo Gonzalez (who stood in for Machado in the race) and Machado as part of what the U.S. described as a scheme to hold onto power.
Rodríguez – who was Maduro’s vice president — was officially recognized by the Trump administration as the “sole head of state” in March, nearly three months after a lightning U.S. military raid snatched Maduro in January and took him into U.S. custody on narcotrafficking charges linked to Cartel de los Soles.
The U.S. lifted sanctions on Rodríguez earlier this month, though Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello retains a $25 million U.S. government bounty on his head for his role in Cartel de los Soles, which is the same drug trafficking organization that the U.S. designated as a terror group. He ran Maduro’s repressive security apparatus but today remains a key figure in the government. Cabello, once Maduro’s chief thug, can now be seen sitting across from high level Trump officials in meetings discussing business deals.
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