Secretary of State Marco Rubio reportedly helped shut down a federal investigation into a businessman involved in President Donald Trump's massive Venezuelan oil deal — and then publicly stated that no such investigation had ever existed.

According to a CNN report, Venezuelan businessman Alejandro Betancourt had spent years under investigation by the Justice Department as part of a sprawling billion-dollar money laundering case. Prosecutors in Miami recently closed the probe, however, after receiving direct orders from then-Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche.

"The move came as part of an effort by Trump White House officials and Secretary of State Marco Rubio to enlist Betancourt to engineer a massive new oil deal with Venezuela's government," the report said.

The reported intervention underscores how the administration's Venezuela policy — which has combined sanctions pressure on the Maduro government with efforts to open commercial channels around the country's oil sector, home to the world's largest proven crude reserves — has increasingly run through private business figures rather than traditional diplomatic channels. Betancourt's transition from federal investigation target to deal partner illustrates the stakes of that approach, and CNN's account, if accurate, would mark an unusual instance of political appointees weighing in on the trajectory of a pending criminal inquiry.

In an interview this week with a Venezuelan broadcaster, Rubio took credit for helping arrange Betancourt's role in the oil deal and defended the businessman as having been fully vetted.

"We thoroughly investigate what we know within our system," Rubio said. "Obviously, if these individuals were under investigation in the United States, and we have checked that with all the authorities, there was no investigation within our system against him."

According to CNN, however, Rubio did not disclose that he "played a key role in why Betancourt is no longer under investigation."

The Justice Department disputed the account that Blanche personally directed prosecutors to shut the case, calling the claim "a complete fabrication," the Friday report said. Betancourt, who is now a partner in Trump's Venezuelan oil plan, was never charged with a crime.

The conflicting accounts — CNN's sourcing on one side, the Justice Department's denial on the other — leave open questions about who directed the probe's closure and on what basis, questions that further reporting or congressional oversight could address.

"Now we have an opportunity to do something that I believe is going to benefit everyone," Rubio said in the interview. "But specifically, in the long term, benefit the Venezuelan people."