The crude oil tanker Skipper recently seized by the U.S. off the coast of Venezuela, seen as the ship was traveling in a southwesterly direction and positioned approximately 33 kilometers north of Guadeloupe, in the southern Caribbean Sea, Dec. 12, 2025.Vantor/AP

The United States stopped an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela on Sunday, just a day after the Coast Guard boarded another oil vessel, according to a report from Bloomberg. 

The operation, which is not approved by Congress, is part of President Trump’s “blockade of all sanctioned oil tankers going into, and out of, Venezuela” in a campaign to cut an essential export that accounts for

© Mother Jones