{"id":108613,"date":"2017-07-27T22:30:20","date_gmt":"2017-07-28T02:30:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=108613"},"modified":"2017-07-27T22:31:26","modified_gmt":"2017-07-28T02:31:26","slug":"russia-sanctions-bill-heads-to-trump-after-senate-approval","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2017\/07\/27\/russia-sanctions-bill-heads-to-trump-after-senate-approval\/","title":{"rendered":"Russia sanctions bill heads to Trump after Senate approval"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"The<\/a>
The Senate voted decisively on Thursday to approve a new package of stiff financial sanctions against Russia, Iran and North Korea, sending the popular bill to President Donald Trump for his signature after weeks of intense negotiations. (Photo<\/a> by Gage Skidmore\/Flickr<\/a>, CC BY-SA 2.0<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

WASHINGTON\u2014The Senate voted decisively on Thursday to approve a new package of stiff financial\u00a0sanctions<\/em>\u00a0<\/em>against\u00a0Russia<\/em>, Iran and North Korea, sending the popular bill to President Donald Trump for his signature after weeks of intense negotiations.<\/p>\n

Never in doubt, however, was a cornerstone of the legislation that bars Trump from easing or waiving the additional penalties on\u00a0Russia<\/em>\u00a0unless Congress agrees. The provisions were included to assuage concerns among lawmakers that the president’s push for better relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin might lead him to relax the penalties without first securing concessions from the Kremlin.<\/p>\n

The Senate passed the bill, 98\u20142, two days after the House pushed the measure through by an overwhelming margin, 419\u20143. Both are veto proof numbers as the White House has wavered on whether the president would sign the measure into law.<\/p>\n

The legislation is aimed at punishing Moscow for meddling in the 2016 presidential election and its military aggression in Ukraine and Syria, where the Kremlin has backed President Bashar Assad.<\/p>\n

Sen. John McCain, R\u2014Ariz., said the bill’s passage was long overdue, a jab at Trump and the GOP\u2014controlled Congress. McCain, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, has called Putin a murderer and a thug.<\/p>\n

\u201cOver the last eight months what price has\u00a0Russia<\/em>\u00a0paid for attacking our elections?\u201d McCain asked. \u201cVery little.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trump had privately expressed frustration over Congress’ ability to limit or override the power of the president on national security matters, according to Trump administration officials and advisers. They spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal White House deliberations.<\/p>\n

But faced with heavy bipartisan support for the bill in the House and Senate, the president has little choice but to sign the bill into law. Trump’s communications director, Anthony Scaramucci, suggested earlier Thursday on CNN’s New Day that Trump might veto the bill and \u201cnegotiate an even tougher deal against the Russians.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sen. Bob Corker, R\u2014Tenn., said that would be a serious mistake and called Scaramucci’s remark an \u201coff\u2014handed comment.\u201d If Trump rejected the bill, Corker said, Congress would overrule him.<\/p>\n

\u201cI cannot imagine anybody is seriously thinking about vetoing this bill,\u201d said Corker, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. \u201cIt’s not good for any president \u2014and most governors don’t like to veto things that are going to be overridden. It shows a diminishment of their authority. I just don’t think that’s a good way to start off as president.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, signing a bill that penalizes\u00a0Russia<\/em>‘<\/em>s election interference would mark a significant shift for Trump. He’s repeatedly cast doubt on the conclusion of U.S. intelligence agencies that\u00a0Russia<\/em>\u00a0sought to tip the election in his favour. And he’s blasted as a \u201cwitch hunt\u201d investigations into the extent of\u00a0Russia<\/em>‘<\/em>s interference and whether the Trump campaign colluded with Moscow.<\/p>\n

The 184\u2014page bill seeks to hit Putin and the oligarchs close to him by targeting Russian corruption, human rights abusers, and crucial sectors of the Russian economy, including weapons sales and energy exports.<\/p>\n

The bill underwent revisions to address concerns voiced by American oil and natural gas companies that\u00a0sanctions<\/em>\u00a0<\/em>specific to\u00a0Russia<\/em>‘<\/em>s energy sector could backfire on them to Moscow’s benefit. The bill raised the threshold for when U.S. firms would be prohibited from being part of energy projects that also included Russian businesses.<\/p>\n

Lawmakers said they also made adjustments so the\u00a0sanctions<\/em>\u00a0on\u00a0Russia<\/em>‘s energy sector didn’t undercut the ability of U.S. allies in Europe to get access to oil and gas resources outside of\u00a0Russia.<\/em><\/p>\n

The North Korea\u00a0sanctions<\/em>\u00a0are intended to thwart Pyongyang’s ambition for nuclear weapons by cutting off access to the cash the reclusive nation needs to follow through with its plans. The bill prohibits ships owned by North Korea or by countries that refuse to comply with U.N. resolutions against it from operating in American waters or docking at U.S. ports. Goods produced by North Korea’s forced labour would be prohibited from entering the United States, according to the bill.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0sanctions<\/em>\u00a0package imposes mandatory penalties on people involved in Iran’s ballistic missile program and anyone who does business with them. The measure would apply terrorism\u00a0sanctions<\/em>\u00a0to the country’s Revolutionary Guards and enforce an arms embargo.<\/p>\n

Sens. Bernie Sanders, I\u2014Vt., and Rand Paul, R\u2014Ky., voted against the\u00a0sanctions<\/em>\u00a0bill.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON\u2014The Senate voted decisively on Thursday to approve a new package of stiff financial\u00a0sanctions\u00a0against\u00a0Russia, Iran and North Korea, sending the …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":108621,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1145,16,483,17],"tags":[19928,312,1509,512],"class_list":["post-108613","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headline","category-news","category-politics","category-news-w","tag-financial-sanctions","tag-iran","tag-north-korea","tag-russia","mauthors-richard-lardner","mauthors-the-associated-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108613","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=108613"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108613\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/108621"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=108613"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=108613"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=108613"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}