US Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal, who is one of the co-authors of the bill on tough sanctions against Russia, has called for speeding up its adoption. He said in a comment to Public.
“Vladimir Putin doesn’t deserve any extra time and we need to speed up the vote on the sanctions bill. Everything the President is doing is in the right direction, but I strongly advocate for sanctions to be 500%, not 100%,” the senator said.
He said there are already 85 supporters of the sanctions document in the Senate and 90 votes are possible if necessary.
“I think the vote is a very achievable and necessary goal. Now is the time to act not only through executive order, but also through legislation to show unity between the president and Congress… We need to vote for this legislation to show Ukraine that we are honouring our commitments,” Blumenthal said.
The bill, which would impose 500 per cent duties on imports from countries that buy Russian oil, gas, uranium and petroleum products, was introduced in Congress in April by Republican Senator Lindsey Graham and Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal.
On 30 May, Blumenthal and Graham said after speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kiev that the US Senate could begin consideration of the sanctions bill, which has broad bipartisan support in the Senate. To pass the bill, it must be approved by the US Senate and House of Representatives and then signed by the president.
Ukraine has repeatedly called on the West to tighten sanctions against Russia, accusing Moscow of dragging out negotiations to end the war.
In June, US President Donald Trump signalled that he may be willing to tighten sanctions against Russia “if necessary” and if Russia demonstrates that it will not “make an agreement” or stop fighting.
On 29 July, Trump said the deadline for Russia to make progress in ending the war against Ukraine was “10 days from today” or he would impose duties and other measures against Moscow. Before that, the US president said he was “very disappointed” with Putin.
The Kremlin said it had “taken into account” US President Donald Trump’s statement. .