The Pentagon could take a 35% stake in Venezuelan oil company NABEP through an office created to finance technology deemed vital to defense. Four senior U.S. Senate Democrats are challenging the proposed deal, asking whether the Defense Department has legal authority to buy equity in a private oil firm.
A Pentagon office, and a contested mandate
The Pentagon’s Office of Strategic Capital would hold the proposed stake. The senators say its mandate covers loans and guarantees, not equity in private oil firms. That gap sits at the center of their challenge. An office set up to finance defense technology is now tied to a proposed oil company investment.
Jeanne Shaheen, Jack Reed, Martin Heinrich and Elizabeth Warren sent a letter on Wednesday, September 30, 2026, to Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth and Energy Secretary Chris Wright. Each senator was the senior Democrat on the foreign relations, armed services, energy or banking committee, respectively. The Wall Street Journal first reported the letter; Quartz and WION carried its contents on October 1.
The senators asked for the agreement text and its legal basis. They also sought the State Department’s plan for purchasing NABEP oil and information about NABEP’s vetting. Their questions extended to whether Trump family members or political donors could benefit. They haven’t received a public answer.
The letter referred to past money-laundering investigations of NABEP leader Alejandro Betancourt in Spain, Switzerland and the United States. It also noted that Betancourt had never been charged and that Rubio had said he was not under active U.S. investigation. Those qualifications remain part of the record, alongside the senators’ questions about who might benefit from the deal.
A challenge without a veto
The 35% stake had already been reported. The senators’ letter turned the dispute into a formal legal challenge from committee leaders overseeing the matter, but it isn’t binding. The administration could still proceed with the deal.
No public response from the Pentagon, State Department or Energy Department had been reported by October 1. It’s also unclear whether the senators set a deadline for answers. The letter puts questions to officials; it doesn’t itself stop the proposed arrangement.
The article reports no grassroots or community response to the oil proposal, and no electoral or legislative remedy beyond the senators’ nonbinding challenge. Legal authority, vetting and possible beneficiaries remain questions, not findings.
Sanctions and the machinery of enforcement
On the same day as the Senate letter, the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control designated 10 targets in an ATM fraud scheme and a separate gang leader. Malware forced cash machines in the United States to dispense cash. Treasury said the operation was “orchestrated by” Anibal Alexander Canelón Aguirre, known as “Prometheus,” who was on the FBI’s ten most-wanted list.
Treasury called Canelón “the alleged engineer of the malware” and said his network was based in Mexico and Venezuela. Reported U.S. losses from such attacks reached US$40.73 million across more than 1,500 attacks as of August 2025. The designation list included two Mexican companies and Juan Gabriel Rivas Núñez, known as “Juancho,” whom the article linked to illegal gold mining. Treasury said its release didn’t identify Canelón’s current location. The sanctions froze any U.S. assets of those named.
A label calling Canelón a “new brain” (nuevo cerebro) came from an X headline shared Thursday morning that placed him in Venezuela. A YouTube newscast by Impacto Venezuela used a similar “brain in Venezuela?” phrase. Treasury’s release didn’t use “brain”; it said Canelón “orchestrated” the scheme. El Nacional and Infobae also didn’t use that label. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Washington would deny “these terrorist financial facilitators the resources they need.”