Trump's Fixation With Foreign Oil

Donald Trump and his then-wife Ivana, right, appear on 'The Oprah Winfrey Show' in 1988. Above, the El Palito refinery rises above a beach in Puerto Cabello, Venezuela. Below, Trump wants to bring down prices at the gasoline pump.WASHINGTON-A smoothfaced 41-year-old Donald Trump settled in before a live studio audience assembled for "The Oprah Winfrey Show" and held forth on how America should be getting a cut of Kuwaiti oil."Kuwait is not paying us for all the oil they're sending out," said Trump, wearing a familiar solid red tie, as Oprah pressed him on his foreign policy views during the April 1988 interview. He complained that the Kuwaitis "live like kings" while the American military protected their tankers amid the Iraq-Iran War."Why aren't they paying us 25% of what they're making?" Trump asked.In media interviews going back to the 1980s-long before he would dominate U.S. politics-Trump outlined his interest in the U.S. seizing oil from countries where Americans intervened. Now, in his second term, he's making an audacious bid to turn his decadeslong fixation into a reality.For the president, America's oil-and now Venezuela's is both a geopolitical tool to use against oil-dependent Russia and Iran and a way to fight another big nemesis: inflation. Trump believes if he can get oil prices down, he can lower Americans' cost of living ahead of the midterms, a senior administration official said.Bolder and more assertive in his second term, Trump has undertaken a slew of initiatives that could bind the U.S. economy to fossil fuels for decades to come. At home, he has delivered a swath of deregulation to free the hands of drillers and undo restrictions on carbon emissions while curbing renewable energy.Abroad, he has voraciously pursued natural resources and pulled the U.S. out of international accords to counter climate change.