Scoop: Trump huddles with oil execs as Iran stalemate drags on

• White House chief of staff Susie Wiles, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, and envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner were on hand, per a source familiar with the meeting.

The big picture: "The president meets with energy executives frequently to get their feedback on domestic and international energy markets," a White House official told us.

• Topics included domestic production, progress in Venezuela, oil futures, natural gas and shipping, the official said.

What we're watching: Trump and Capitol Hill Republicans are bracing for the political fallout of high U.S. gasoline prices, which are tethered to crude oil prices set on global markets now facing a historic loss of supply.

• Average U.S. gasoline prices were $4.18 per gallon on Tuesday, per AAA. That's the most expensive since the war began and the highest since 2022.
• The White House has taken steps to ease the price surge, such as waiving the Jones Act, which requires U.S.-built and -owned ships to move goods between domestic ports.

• But it faces limited options to ease the market shock.

Zoom out: Uncertainty weighs on companies, and if prices stay high enough for long enough, it will cut into oil demand in the U.S. and abroad.

• The de facto closing of the Strait of Hormuz, which handles about a fourth of the world's seaborne oil, has sent prices to multiyear highs.
• But throttled supply from the region is also boosting the market for U.S. oil and liquefied natural gas exports.