The U.S. Congress will begin advancing a Russia sanctions bill “with the blessing” of President Donald Trump, Sen. Lindsey Graham announced.
“The bill allows the president to impose secondary sanctions and tariffs at his discretion on countries that continue to buy cheap Russian oil and gas, supporting Putin’s war machine. This legislation is designed to give President Trump more flexibility and authority to push Putin toward peace talks by targeting both Putin himself and countries like Iran that support him. I appreciate the strong bipartisan support for this bill in both the House and the Senate,” Graham wrote.
His statement also notes that Trump’s sanctions on Russia’s two largest oil companies [“Rosneft” and “Lukoil”] have played an important role, and that the Russia sanctions bill “will continue moving toward ending this war with dignity, fairly, and once and for all.”
A day earlier, Trump said Republicans are working on legislation that would sanction any country doing business with Russia. He separately indicated that Iran could be added to that list.
Several days ago, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Washington has nearly run out of options for new measures against Moscow: “We are running out of targets to sanction... I don’t know what else needs to be done.”
