President Trump’s team won’t say yet if he will sign or veto legislation imposing new sanctions on Russia, which is poised for congressional passage after a weekend breakthrough in negotiations.
“He’s going to study that legislation and see what the final product looks like,” White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told reporters on Air Force One.
It’s another mixed message on the bill from the Trump White House, and Sanders herself. On Sunday, she said Trump was going to sign the bill.
“We support where the legislation is now, and will continue to work with the House and Senate to put those tough sanctions in place on Russia until the situation in Ukraine is fully resolved. But it certainly isn’t right now,” she said on “This Week” on ABC.
At about the same time, incoming White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci was saying it was unclear what Trump would do if the bill comes to his desk.
Trump’s administration has lobbied against the bill, which retaliates against the 2016 election interference as well as Russian aggression in Ukraine and Syria, because it threatens to tie their hands in negotiations with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Lawmakers in both parties ignored those concerns, while coupling the Russian sanctions to bills cracking down on Iran and North Korea — top national security priorities for the administration.
“North Korea, Iran, and Russia have in different ways all threatened their neighbors and actively sought to undermine American interests,” House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy and Foreign Affairs Chairman Ed Royce said Saturday. “The bill the House will vote on next week will now exclusively focus on these nations and hold them accountable for their dangerous actions.”
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has acknowledged the threats posed by each country, but he has cited Russia’s status as the possessor of a major nuclear weapons arsenal to argue for rehabilitating relations.
He warned lawmakers the Russia bill, which places tight restrictions on the president’s ability to use discretion when imposing or lifting the sanctions, could impede such diplomacy.
“I would urge Congress to ensure any legislation allows the president to have the flexibility to adjust sanctions to meet the needs of what is always an evolving diplomatic situation,” Tillerson told House lawmakers in June.
That appeal fell on deaf ears in both parties. And yet, the legislation still hit a partisan snag in the House, as a procedural hurdle provided the occasion for protracted fight about how much power House Democrats would have to oversee Trump’s implementation of the sanctions.
The lawmakers wanted the ability to force votes on resolutions of disapproval pertaining to those decisions, while House Republicans worried they would abuse the process to consume the legislative calendar and block the GOP agenda.
But Senate Democrats agreed to a change that undercut the House Democratic demands by making all resolutions of disapproval “non-privileged” under congressional rules. That means that House Speaker Paul Ryan will have his customary authority over whether the disapproval bills receive a vote.
“Ultimately, I think the Senate having acted once to adjust that procedure played a big part in this,” a senior House Republican aide told the Washington Examiner. “But I also think that there is an overwhelming desire to move this bill forward and an understanding that this bill is still a very strong solid sanctions bill, with a very meaningful congressional review component.”
However, the fight over Democratic oversight provided time for one other significant change to the sanctions bill.
The original version, which passed the Senate with overwhelming support, imposed aggressive sanctions on Russia’s energy sector — restricting western access to oil and gas carried on Russian pipelines and barring U.S. companies from working on projects that involve Russian companies.
The House modified those provisions to clarify that pipelines that pass through Russia, between two other countries, are not targeted by the bill. And it also clarified that American companies can work on international energy projects if Russian companies have only a small stake in the project.
“[Under the original Senate bill], you could have [had] Russian energy companies going and buying up small stakes and projects around the world to keep American companies from being in the game,” the House Republican aide explained.
Those negotiations didn’t pertain to Trump’s core desire.
“Essentially, we would ask for the flexibility to turn the heat up when we need to, but also to ensure that we have the ability to maintain a constructive dialogue,” Tillerson said in June.
