A quiet but dangerous conflict is brewing within President Trump’s foreign policy team — a battle between the true red America First voices who made his first term successful and the same old neoconservative ideologues who have derailed U.S. diplomacy for decades.

Heightened by the bombing of Iran, this clash made headlines again earlier this month. This time, it was over botched negotiations over the return of Americans currently held by the socialist Venezuelan government.

Marco Rubio’s hatred of Latin American socialism is clear, but that shouldn’t come at a strategic cost to our country.

Trump’s special envoy Richard Grenell, a realist to his core, was on the verge of brokering a deal that would have secured the release of imprisoned Americans in exchange for Chevron’s continued operations in Venezuela. It was classic Trump diplomacy: bold, transactional, results-oriented.

But Secretary of State Marco Rubio intervened. The State Department made a much less attractive and watered-down proposal to repatriate 250 Venezuelan aliens in exchange for the American prisoners. The interests of the U.S. oil industry were completely ignored.

Wires were crossed, and the talks collapsed.

Two critical lessons

Two lessons are evident: The first and most obvious is that Grenell is responsible for talks with Venezuela and that he is the only U.S. figure Venezuela trusts — a point that shouldn’t be undermined.

The second is that Trump’s transactional diplomacy, represented by Grenell, works — when it’s allowed to. We’ve seen this with Steve Witkoff’s trips to the Middle East and the president’s own handling of NATO.

The Venezuelan government wants to negotiate with Grenell and Grenell alone — and for good reason. He speaks the language of leverage, not lectures. As special envoy, he has built a diplomatic channel that has delivered in the past. In January, for example, Grenell secured the release of six Americans, a great achievement.

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Photo by PEDRO MATTEY/AFP via Getty Images

In contrast, Venezuela all but refuses to communicate with Rubio. They see him as persona non grata. His methods, based on intervention and blunt force, are bound to fail.

This is particularly true now that we live in a world where U.S. dominance is not guaranteed. And as the United States has isolated Venezuela, the Latin American nation has been pushed deeper into Beijing’s orbit.

Oil exports to China, for example, have surged since Chevron’s license to operate was canceled in May. In turn, Venezuelan exports to the U.S. and its capitalist allies have cratered.

The strategic cost

Rubio’s hatred of Latin American socialism is clear, but that shouldn’t come at a strategic cost to our country. This isn’t a diplomatic blunder. It’s a threat to U.S. energy security and a betrayal of Trump’s promise to bring down prices at the pump.

We want Venezuelan oil and gas to head to the U.S. Gulf Coast, not Beijing. We need to protect the Monroe Doctrine, which says that no outside power should have a foothold in the Western Hemisphere.

The importance of energy security cannot be overstated. For an administration elected in large part on its promise to cut gas prices, it is a big mistake to turn our backs on Venezuela’s hydrocarbon reserves, the largest on earth.

Doing so increases American dependence on Canadian oil — not a smart move as we fight a trade war with Prime Minister Mark Carney — and on suppliers in a volatile Middle East, where Iran still looms large.

This is not to mention that the policy of isolation is damaging to Chevron, a champion of the American oil industry.

Under its former special license, Chevron was pumping out nearly a quarter of a million barrels of oil per day. This went straight to thirsty refiners on the U.S. Gulf Coast, which depend on Venezuela’s unique heavy crude oil. That lifeline has been cut, and it’s American consumers who will pay the price.

Grenell understood this and so wrapped Chevron’s status into his negotiations, a deal that put American interests first. Rubio, on the other hand, prioritized an ideological pursuit of regime change over American energy security.

President Trump should intervene.

He praised Grenell’s successful negotiations in January and should make clear that Venezuela policy is not for Rubio to decide. The goal is clear: Bring our citizens home, restart Chevron’s work, and reassert U.S. influence in our own hemisphere.

Renew Grenell’s leverage

Grenell, with renewed powers, should return the United States to a policy of strategic engagement. That’s what America First really looks like. That’s the approach to foreign policy promised to us in 2024. That’s the MAGA way.

It’s time to put the neocons back in the box and go back to the bold, pragmatic diplomacy that made Trump’s first term — and will make his second — a victory for everyday Americans and a triumphant return to common sense.