Democratic Senators Elizabeth Warren, Mass., and Jeanne Shaheen, N.H., have released a minority staff report alleging that the Trump administration is failing to effectively use U.S. sanctions and export controls against Russia.
According to a press release issued by the two lawmakers, the report found that the administration “has not rolled out a single new sanctions or export control package aimed at Russia’s war in Ukraine in over six months, despite escalating Russian aggression and a growing wave of sanctions evasion efforts.” Warren and Shaheen believe this inaction has weakened U.S. leverage in negotiations and “signaled the world that pressure is off”.
The report explains how, since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, the U.S. and its G7 partners have regularly imposed and perfected an unprecedented range of sanctions and export controls aimed at restricting Russia’s ability to acquire foreign inputs to build its war machine and limiting the revenue that Russia needs to finance its expanding defense budget. According to the report, these efforts “reduced significantly the flow of critical G7 technologies to Russia and compelled Moscow to import key goods by covert and irregular means, at higher cost.”
However, the report alleges that the Trump administration (1) immediately stopped taking basic sanctions and export control actions that had maintained and increased U.S. pressure, despite a growing number of Russian circumvention efforts; (2) has further undermined Ukraine’s leverage by repeatedly signaling a lack of commitment to maintaining effective sanctions; (3) has failed to capitalize on an opening to drive down Russian oil revenue; and (4) its decisions across agencies have strained staffing that supports the Russia sanctions and export controls.
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