Bessent: U.S. to Use Iranian Oil Against Iran, Flood Market to Crush Prices
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent laid out a tough, pragmatic plan on Fox Business to blunt soaring oil prices amid the conflict with Iran. The U.S. is prepared to unsanction roughly 140 million barrels of Iranian crude already loaded and floating at sea, turning Tehran’s own oil into a weapon to keep global markets stable and deny economic wins to the regime and its main buyer, China.
In his interview with Maria Bartiromo on “Mornings with Maria,” Bessent described a coordinated administration strategy that mirrors the earlier approach with Russian oil.
Bessent stated: “Maria, to be clear, this is a coordinated effort. We had a break-the-glass plan across the administration and at Treasury. We unsanctioned Russian oil. We knew that there were about 130 million barrels on the water, and we created supply that is beyond the Straits of Hormuz. So we anticipated this. We knew that there could be a temporary—and I want to emphasize temporary—chokepoint there, and there was 130 million barrels of floating storage. In the coming days we may unsanction the Iranian oil that’s on the water to about 140 million barrels. So depending how you count it is 10-2 weeks supply that Iranians had been pushing out would have all gone [to] China. In essence will be using the Iranian barrel against Iranians to keep the price down for the next 10 or 14 days as we continue this campaign. So, we have lots of levers—we’ve got plenty more that we can do.”
He continued: “The largest coordinated SPR release in history, 400 million barrels, was approved last week and some countries are going to do more but you know what? The US could unilaterally do another SPR release to keep the price down. As you will have noted, WTI and its European counterpart Brent had substantially diverged over the past few trading sessions. You know they were trading right on top of each other last week. And this is because the US, thanks to President Trump in his first term [and] continuing efforts here, is virtually energy independent. Yeah. When President Trump says our allies should join us [in] any coalition along the straits from Hormuz [to] close that they’re the ones who need this oil. The US, we are an oil exporter.”
The move avoids direct intervention in futures markets, focusing instead on physical supply boosts to protect American consumers and allies from price shocks while maintaining pressure on Iran. No new sanctions relief for Iran’s onshore production or regime coffers—just smart use of existing cargoes to hit the regime where it hurts: economically. America First energy policy in action.
Bessent stated: “Maria, to be clear, this is a coordinated effort. We had a break-the-glass plan across the administration and at Treasury. We unsanctioned Russian oil. We knew that there were about 130 million barrels on the water, and we created supply that is beyond the Straits of Hormuz.
So we anticipated this. We knew that there could be a temporary—and I want to emphasize temporary—chokepoint there, and there was 130 million barrels of floating storage. In the coming days we may unsanction the Iranian oil that’s on the water to about 140 million barrels.
So depending how you count it is 10-2 weeks supply that Iranians had been pushing out would have all gone [to] China. In essence will be using the Iranian barrel against Iranians to keep the price down for the next 10 or 14 days as we continue this campaign. So, we have lots of levers—we’ve got plenty more that we can do.”
He continued: “The largest coordinated SPR release in history, 400 million barrels, was approved last week and some countries are going to do more but you know what? The US could unilaterally do another SPR release to keep the price down. As you will have noted, WTI and its European counterpart Brent had substantially diverged over the past few trading sessions.
You know they were trading right on top of each other last week. And this is because the US, thanks to President Trump in his first term [and] continuing efforts here, is virtually energy independent. Yeah. When President Trump says our allies should join us [in] any coalition along the straits from Hormuz [to] close that they’re the ones who need this oil. The US, we are an oil exporter.”
The move avoids direct intervention in futures markets, focusing instead on physical supply boosts to protect American consumers and allies from price shocks while maintaining pressure on Iran.
No new sanctions relief for Iran’s onshore production or regime coffers—just smart use of existing cargoes to hit the regime where it hurts: economically.