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The Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services (FDACS) released an urgent consumer notification that Citgo fuel services from the Port of Tampa accidentally mixed Diesel Fuel into gasoline tanker trucks that offloaded product at gas pumps in Tampa, Fort Myers, Cape Coral and other areas. [FDACS Notice HERE] Customers who purchased Citgo gas at the affected areas after August 26th are at risk. Those fuel stations pumped diesel instead of unleaded gasoline. (AP) – […] The Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services said late Sunday that gasoline purchased after 10 a.m. Saturday at some Citgo-supplied stations had a...

The Biden administration is set to give Chevron Corp. a license to pump oil in Venezuela, according to The Wall Street Journal. As part of the deal, Chevron would retain partial control of both production and maintenance for a select set of run-down oil fields it previously had stakes in with Petróleos de Venezuela SA, a state-run oil company in Venezuela, according to the WSJ, citing people familiar with the matter.

Asdrubal Chavez, chief executive of Houston-based Citgo Petroleum Corp, boarded the Venezuelan-owned firm's corporate jet in Caracas on Jan. 30, after meeting with top officials of the embattled administration of socialist President Nicolas Maduro about the latest U.S. oil sanctions. Upon landing in the Bahamas - where Chavez has worked for about a year after being denied a U.S. visa - he had received word from Houston that it would be his last trip on a company plane and that his Citgo email account had been shut off. Day-to-day control of the company had passed to Citgo's top U.S. executive,...

Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro, who already has a legal president waiting in the wings to take the reins, now has a mountain of U.S. pressure to get out while the getting's good. He's not much for Twitter, but in the last few hours, he's been going like gangbusters, or, well, in his case, gangs, trying to rally the left to his regime and get his "narrative" for them out. Look at this amazingly long string of recent tweets. The big thing making him scream publicly is news of the crushing round of sanctions employed by President Trump and his dream...

The Treasury Department plans to claim Venezuela's U.S.-based international reserves and state-owned assets - including oil refiner and distributor Citgo - on behalf of the newly recognized government headed by opposition leader Juan Guaidó, removing them from the control of President Nicolás Maduro. In a vaguely worded statement issued late Friday, Treasury said that "the United States will use its economic and diplomatic tools to ensure that commercial transactions by the Venezuelan government, including those involving its state-owned enterprises and international reserves, are consistent" with its recognition of the Guaidó government.

We already learned that Russia was sending bombers to Venezuela for military exercises and supporting the country’s imploding economy. What could Vladimir Putin have wanted in exchange? We’re probably seeing the answer come into focus as Russia moves in to “help” Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro as we head into the new year. Putin is going to bail out Maduro’s failing government with some cash in exchange for establishing some measure of control over that nation’s vast crude oil reserves that are currently lying mostly dormant. (WaPo) As allies go, Venezuela is a relatively cheap one for Russia. But the potential...

Just days before Thanksgiving last year, a group of longtime Houston residents landed in South America for a meeting about Citgo, the U.S.-based, Venezuela-owned oil company where they worked. But the meeting was a ruse. Instead of discussing business, the company executives were fired, arrested, and thrown in jail two days before planned family gatherings, accused of negotiating a loan on poor terms. One year later, the deposed executives — including five naturalized American citizens — remain in custody as Venezuela’s authoritarian government presides over an economic collapse and ever-worsening relations with the Trump administration.

Once the inevitable collapse of Citgo happens, the ruling drug cartel in Venezuela will inevitably enter it’s final phase. Today, Venezuela is unable to refine oil into gasoline, so in turn it is purchased from Citgo and all but given away for domestic consumption. This has given rise to a vast network of gasoline smuggling, often by the military itself, which steals the gasoline in transit then sells it in other nations for a huge profit while remaining well under the market price. Gasoline is so cheap in Venezuela, one can purchase around 875,000 gallons of 87 octane for $1....

A U.S. federal judge authorized the seizure of Citgo Petroleum Corp. to satisfy a Venezuelan government debt, a ruling that could set off a scramble among Venezuela’s many unpaid creditors to wrest control of its only obviously seizable U.S. asset.

Five former Citgo executives who are U.S. citizens remain detained in Venezuela following the surprise Saturday release of former Mormon missionary Joshua Holt. Two sources aware of efforts to free the men tell the Washington Examiner they have not been released after more than six months in captivity. A source said one detainee suffers from health issues and has lost 50 pounds in dungeon-like conditions. They said recent family requests for intervention from Citgo went unanswered.

Claiming he was just trying to free Josh Holt, a devout young Mormon from Utah held hostage by Venezuela's Maduro regime on phony charges, left-wing Illinois Democratic senator Dick Durbin isn't exactly credible about his real mission in his secret visit to Caracas this past week. Rep. Pete Sessions, a Dallas-based Republican, isn't exactly believable, either, given that he called his secret trip with Durbin "a peace mission" to Caracas last week.

A senior Trump administration official said Monday that former Citgo executives detained for four months in Venezuela are being used as “hostages” and “bargaining chips” by President Nicolas Maduro’s government. Venezuelan authorities detained six Citgo executives in November, after the Trump administration imposed sanctions limiting the flow of corporate cash from the Houston-based company to Venezuela. At least four of the detained executives are naturalized U.S. citizens. The ousted executives quickly faded from headlines last year as family members decided not to seek press coverage, but their case and the current situation at Citgo have been probed quietly by a...

NEW YORK — Russia is on the verge of taking control of a US oil company. In a crazy twist of international events, Russia’s state-owned oil company Rosneft might end up owning Citgo, a US energy company based in Houston, Texas. [snip] If PDVSA can’t pay its bills on time, Rosneft will almost certainly get control of Citgo. All Rosneft would need to do is buy a few more of PDVSA’s bonds to get over the 50% ownership threshold. “The Russians have a lot to gain through the PDVSA-Rosneft-Citgo asset transfer to the detriment of US interests,” wrote Republican Congressman...

Senators are alarmed about the national security implications of Russia acquiring a significant ownership share in an oil company whose terminals span 20 states across the nation. In a letter to Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, who is chairman of the inter-agency Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, Sens. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), John Cornyn (R-Texas), Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Bill Cassidy (R-La.) and Ted Cruz (R-Texas) say he needs to be prepared to protect U.S. energy infrastructure should Rosneft carry through with seizing control of CITGO Petroleum Corporation’s Venezuelan parent company, state-owned Petroleos de Venezuela S.A. Oil...

As pure desperation has set in, crime has becomes inevitable. A man accused of mugging people in the streets of Caracas was surrounded by a mob of onlookers, beaten and set on fire, who published a pixeled-out but still graphic video of the man burning as mob justice is now the supreme arbiter of who lives and who dies: "Roberto Fuentes Bernal, 42, was reportedly caught trying to mug passersby in the Venezuelan capital and before police arrived at the scene, the crowd took the law into their own hands." The video can be seen here. Now, in the latest...

Rep. Greg Meeks will head up a U.S. delegation attending the funeral Friday of Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, a decision by President Barack Obama that is drawing attention because of the congressman’s previous ties to Chávez. … Former Massachusetts Democratic Rep. Bill Delahunt is also part of the U.S. funeral delegation. Like Meeks, Delahunt drew criticism in 2005 for meeting the Venezuelan dictator to discuss a deal for discounted heating oil to help low-income residents of Massachusetts. …

If there's one thing that's good in California, it's that there are no or very few Citgo gas stations out here. Citgo is the Venezuelan-owned oil company who decided to fly the American flag at half-staff in Houston, Texas to mourning the death of Hugo Chavez. Yes, our flag is being flown at half-staff to mourn the loss of a socialist dictator.

U.S. Rep. William Delahunt blew nearly $560,000 in campaign cash last year - much of it on lavish meals and a family-friendly payroll that includes his ex-wife, son-in-law and daughter - stoking speculation the Quincy Democrat is emptying his war chest and won’t seek re-election. -snip- Delahunt told the Herald last week that he was still weighing whether to seek re-election, but Democratic Party sources have privately indicated his departure is anticipated - and expected to draw a host of candidates-in-waiting out of the woodwork.

Health Care: Remember Cuba's vaunted medical missionaries — those who treated the poor abroad for nothing, supposedly out of selfless motives? A lawsuit shows they were nothing but a communist slave racket. It ought to bear a few lessons for our own country as the role of doctors in the health care debate drags on. Back in 1963, Cuban dictator Fidel Castro launched a much-praised initiative to share Cuba's medical doctors with the poor around the world. The idea, of course, was to appear to be acting on higher motives than the profit-driven doctors in free societies. It was small...

Venezuela-owned CITGO is preparing yet another effort to polish a corporate image seriously tarnished by its association with anti-American dictator Hugo Chavez. A major polling organization is surveying consumer attitudes and measuring the impact of CITGO’s ongoing campaigns which are coming up short as many Americans vote with their tires and buy gas elsewhere.