The US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) has targeted the assets of six Venezuelan officials for stoppage and confiscation. It has done so in accordance with Executive Order 13692.

All property and interests in property of these individuals, and of any entities of which they own half, either directly or indirectly, that are in the United States or in the possession or control of Americans are to be 'blocked' and reported to OFAC. OFAC’s regulations generally prohibit all dealings by US persons or within (or transiting) the United States that involve any property or interests in property of blocked or designated persons. Since much of the global financial system's financial traffic goes through New York, this is a serious problem for any country whose enemy is the United States Government.

The following six "politically-exposed persons" or PEPs are officials of the world's most oil-rich state.
 
• Richard Jesus Lopez Vargas (Lopez) is a Major General and the Commanding General of the Venezuelan National Guard, or the Guardia Nacional Bolivariana, commonly referred to as the GNB, as well as a member of the High Command of the GNB.

• Jesus Maria Mantilla Oliveros (Mantilla) is a Major General and the Commander of Strategic Integral Defense Region Guayana, or the Región Estratégica de Defensa Integral Guayana, commonly referred to as REDI Guayana.

• Alberto Mirtiliano Bermudez Valderrey (Bermudez) is the Division General for the Integral Defense Zone in Bolivar State, or Zona Operativa de Defensa Integral del estado Bolivar, commonly referenced to as ZODI Bolivar State, bordering on Brazil.

• Jose Leonardo Norono Torres (Norono) is the Division General and Commander for the Integral Defense Zone in Tachira State, commonly referred to as ZODI Tachira State, bordering on Colombia.

• Jose Miguel Dominguez Ramirez (Dominguez) is the Chief Commissioner of a special police unit called the FAES, or the Fuerzas de Acciones Especiales, in Tachira State. He also used to be the Director of Operations of the FAES, which falls within Venezuela’s Bolivarian National Police, or Policia Nacional Bolivariana, commonly referred to as the PNB.

• Cristhiam Abelardo Morales Zambrano (Morales) is the Director of the PNB and a Colonel in the High Command/GNB.

Before this, on 25 February, the US sanctioned the following four officials.

• Omar Jose Prieto Fernandez (Prieto) is the Governor of Zulia State, a position that he has held since December 2017. Known for its massive oil fields below Lake Maracaibo, Zulia is amongst the highest energy-consuming states in Venezuela.

• Ramon Alonso Carrizalez Rengifo (Carrizalez) is the Governor of Apure State, located on the border with Colombia. He was the Vice President of Venezuela between 2008 and early January 2010, as well as the Minister of Defence between 2009 and early January 2010.

• Jorge Luis Garcia Carneiro (Garcia) is the Governor of Vargas State, a position that he has held since 2008. He used to be the head of the Venezuelan Army between January 2003 and January 2004, then became the Minister of Defence until December 2006. He also used to be the Minister for Social Development and Popular Participation.

• Rafael Alejandro Lacava Evangelista (Lacava) is the Governor of Carabobo State, a position that he has held since October 2017. He formerly served as Mayor of Puerto Cabello, the municipality that is home to Venezuela’s largest port, and before that was the Venezuelan Ambassador to Italy, a position to which he was appointed in February 2007. Lacava has long been a friend of former-President Maduro's. In early 2018, Lacava was accused of hiding funds - the Treasury does not say what kind of funds - in Switzerland and Andorra.

On 28 January, OFAC also placed Petróleos de Venezuela SA (PdVSA, Venezuela's state-owned oil company) on the List of Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons (the SDN List), doing so on the authority of Executive Order 13850. A new book out by Andrew McCabe, the former FBI acting director, quotes President Trump saying at a White House meeting in 2017: "I don’t understand why we’re not looking at Venezuela. Why we’re not at war with Venezuela? They have all the oil and they’re in our back door."

John Bolton, the president's National Security Advisor, told Fox News in January: "We're looking at the oil assets. That's the single most important income stream to the Government of Venezuela. We're looking at what to do to that. We're in conversation with major American companies now that are either in Venezuela or, in the case of Citgo, here in the United States. I think we're trying to get to the same end result here. You know, Venezuela's one of the three countries I call the "troika of tyranny." It will make a big difference to the United States economically if we could have American oil companies really invest in and produce the oil capabilities in Venezuela."