President Trump says a newly announced oil deal with the Venezuelan government will replenish the US Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR), describing a "'topping out' process" that he says will begin shortly. The proposal faces questions over its legality, the time and scale of future Venezuelan production, and whether Venezuela's mostly extra-heavy crude can be stored in the reserve. The Energy Department has previously said heavy-oil storage costs outweigh the benefits and creates operational difficulties. The SPR fell by 3 million barrels in the latest weekly update to 286.6 million barrels from 289.7 million, its lowest level in more than 43 years and about 40% of its level when Trump first took office in 2017. The reserve holds about 97.3 million barrels of sweet crude and 189.3 million barrels of sour crude, with no heavy crude. Oil prices rose Monday despite Trump's claim that the deal would "substantially lower Gas Prices for all Americans," suggesting market skepticism. Traders are focusing more immediately on US-Iran tensions, while Trump is expected to meet refiners and fuel retailers this week as the administration highlights efforts to lower gasoline prices that remain above $4 per gallon. The US and Venezuela have outlined a planned joint venture involving the US government and an unnamed private operator, with 100-year leases for Venezuelan oil fields estimated by geologists to contain billions of barrels, but no contract has been publicly released. Venezuela has the world's largest proven oil reserves yet has struggled for decades to develop them into major production, and extracting the crude could take years or decades.