Secretary of State Marco Rubio with Margaret Brennan of CBS’s Face the Nation

In this context the U.S. “oil quarantine” is not a formal naval blockade but a policy of using U.S. sanctions and military/naval enforcement to stop most Venezuelan oil from reaching world markets. In practice it means:

• U.S. sanctions designate Venezuela’s state oil firm PDVSA, many intermediaries, and specific tankers, so any of their property under U.S. jurisdiction is legally “blocked.”
• U.S. forces focus on intercepting and seizing tankers that are under U.S. sanctions or carrying sanctioned Venezuelan crude, after U.S. authorities obtain court orders.

Rubio’s description in the interview (seizing a sanctioned boat after getting a court order) matches this. Legally, the “quarantine” rests mainly on U.S. sanctions law and emergency powers, especially executive orders against Venezuela’s oil sector issued under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) and the National Emergencies Act, plus civil and criminal forfeiture statutes that let U.S. courts order seizure of sanctioned property.

It is framed as sanctions enforcement, not a declared act-of-war blockade, which is why officials consistently call it a “quarantine” of sanctioned oil shipments rather than a general closure of Venezuelan ports.

Public reporting and Rubio’s own description show a two-step process:

1. Identification

   • The Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) investigates which companies and tankers are operating in Venezuela’s oil sector or helping PDVSA evade sanctions, using shipping data, AIS transponders, satellite imagery, and PDVSA documents.
   • OFAC then designates specific firms and tankers on the U.S. sanctions list, which legally “blocks” their property under U.S. jurisdiction and warns others that dealings with them are sanctionable.

2. Interdiction and seizure

   • Rubio says that if “there’s a boat and that boat is under U.S. sanctions. We go get a court order. We will seize it,” meaning Justice Department lawyers seek seizure/forfeiture warrants in a U.S. federal court.
   • U.S. Coast Guard and Navy units in the Caribbean then intercept targeted tankers (for example, several have been pursued or stopped near Venezuela), board them, and direct them to ports where the U.S. can enforce the court order and hold the vessel as blocked property.

This is how the U.S. has been enforcing the Venezuela oil sanctions regime against “shadow fleet” or “ghost ship” tankers and other sanctioned vessels.

Rubio doesn’t list every tool, but from his comments and current U.S. policy the “multiple levers of leverage” clearly include:

• Oil quarantine / naval interdiction – Using a large U.S. naval and Coast Guard deployment to stop and, with court orders, seize sanctioned tankers moving Venezuelan oil, sharply limiting the regime’s export revenue.
• Economic and financial sanctions – Existing OFAC sanctions on PDVSA, Venezuela’s oil sector, and senior officials; new designations of oil traders and specific tankers; and the threat of expanding or tightening those sanctions.
• Criminal indictments and legal pressure – U.S. narco‑terrorism and drug‑trafficking cases against Maduro and senior officials (like Diosdado Cabello), along with large bounties and extradition demands, which hang over remaining power‑holders.
• Diplomatic recognition and access to investment – The U.S. can choose whom it recognizes as legitimate, and it can facilitate or hinder Western investment needed to rebuild Venezuela’s oil industry, which Rubio explicitly frames as conditional on political and security changes.
• Reserved military options – Rubio repeatedly stresses that while there is no plan for an occupation, Trump “retains optionality” and has already demonstrated willingness to use force, which itself is a form of leverage.

Together, these are the “levers” he is referring to when he says the U.S. can keep pressuring whoever governs in Caracas.

Delcy Rodríguez is a long‑time Chavista politician who served as Venezuela’s foreign minister and, since 2018, as executive vice president under Nicolás Maduro.

After Maduro’s capture by U.S. forces, Venezuela’s Supreme Court ordered her to assume the presidency, and the armed forces publicly recognized her as acting or interim president. Trump and Rubio also refer to her as having been “sworn in” as Venezuela’s leader, though the U.S. is not endorsing her politically and Rubio says Washington will “make our assessments” based on her actions.

María Corina Machado and Edmundo González Urrutia are leading opposition figures:

• María Corina Machado – A long‑time opposition leader and head of the Vente Venezuela party, later awarded the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize for her pro‑democracy activism. She won the 2023 opposition primary but was barred from office by Maduro‑aligned institutions.
• Edmundo González – A retired diplomat chosen as the opposition’s unity candidate for the 2024 presidential election after Machado was disqualified. Independent tallies and many foreign governments, including the U.S., have treated that election as fraudulent and considered González the rightful winner.

Rubio, echoing prior U.S. statements, says he has “tremendous admiration” for both and reiterates that the 2024 election was illegitimate and that Maduro was “not a legitimate president.” He previously called González “the rightful president of Venezuela,” and in this interview he does not retract that view. However, he also stresses that the current U.S. “mission” is focused on security interests (drugs, gangs, foreign influence) and that Washington will judge any interim authorities, including Delcy Rodríguez, “by what they do.” In practice, that means the U.S. still regards Machado and González as the legitimate democratic winners but is, for now, negotiating primarily with whoever controls the state in Caracas.

Diosdado Cabello and several other senior Venezuelan officials, including the defense minister, are under U.S. criminal indictment and remain formally wanted, regardless of whether they were captured in the recent raid.

• A superseding indictment in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York charges Nicolás Maduro, Diosdado Cabello, Cilia Flores and others with narco‑terrorism, drug‑trafficking, and related crimes.
• The U.S. State Department has publicly posted multi‑million‑dollar rewards for information leading to the arrest and/or conviction of Cabello and the defense minister (Vladimir Padrino López), treating them as fugitives.

Rubio confirms in the interview that they are still “wanted by the United States”; the administration prioritized seizing Maduro and his wife in a single, difficult operation rather than trying to simultaneously raid multiple military installations to arrest every indicted official.

By the “Southern District” Rubio means the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York (SDNY), a federal trial court based in Manhattan that often handles major international narcotics and corruption cases.

When someone like Maduro is “brought to the Southern District,” the usual process is:

1. Transfer into federal custody and initial appearance – The arrested person is delivered to U.S. marshals and taken before a federal magistrate judge in SDNY, typically within 24–48 hours, to be informed of the charges and of their rights, and to address detention (bail vs. pre‑trial custody).
2. Arraignment on the indictment – The defendant appears for arraignment, is formally charged under the existing indictment, and enters a plea (almost always “not guilty” at this stage).
3. Pre‑trial proceedings and trial or plea – Both sides exchange evidence (“discovery”), litigate motions (for example, to suppress evidence), and either negotiate a plea agreement or proceed to a jury trial before a district judge. If convicted or if there is a guilty plea, the judge later imposes sentence under federal law.

So Rubio’s comment that Maduro “is now in New York, the residence of the Southern District” means Maduro is being held in New York to face that SDNY indictment through this standard federal criminal process.