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Wright Tells Ben Shapiro Venezuelan Oil Output Could Rise 30 to 50 Percent in 12 to 18 Months

January 9, 2026 · U.S. Department of Energy · 0:07:40

Embedded from the source channel — never re-uploaded. Watch on YouTube

What happened

Energy Secretary Chris Wright joined the Ben Shapiro Show the day after the President released a fact sheet on Venezuela’s oil industry. Wright explained that Venezuelan oil is a heavier, more viscous crude suited to products such as asphalt, that it is generally cheaper, and that many U.S. refineries built in the 1960s and 1970s were designed to process it when Venezuela was a major supplier.

Wright said Venezuela’s industry had fallen off a cliff under socialism and top-down control, forcing the United States to find heavy crude elsewhere. He said the short-term agenda in Venezuela is to stop criminality and the flow of drugs, gangs, and violence into the United States, and that fixing Venezuela is good for Americans and Venezuelans alike, describing the Energy Department’s aim as unleashing prosperity and peace across the Western Hemisphere.

On investment, Wright said large ten-year development projects of around $10 billion might not start for another year or two, but that the trajectory of Venezuelan production would turn upward immediately. He guessed Venezuelan oil production could be 30, 40, or 50 percent higher in 12 to 18 months than today, and said he thought that quite likely.

Why it matters

Wright’s production forecast is the administration’s first quantified expectation for the Venezuela oil opening, and its 12-to-18-month window makes it one of the energy agenda’s most directly testable predictions.

Scoreboard watch

Wright predicted on January 9, 2026 that Venezuelan oil production could be 30 to 50 percent higher within 12 to 18 months — a forecast checkable against reported Venezuelan output in mid-2027.

Sources: U.S. Department of Energy, “Secretary Wright Joins the Ben Shapiro Show - January 9, 2026”, 2026-01-09 (official upload, embedded above; published 2026-01-09). Transcript via Supadata (private research store, paraphrased and attributed, not republished). All figures and characterizations as stated by the speakers.