President Trump should impose sanctions on Turkey if a jailed American pastor accused of involvement in a failed coup is not released, a Senate Republican lawmaker argued Thursday.
“They’re literally holding an American — we think trying to use him as some sort of leverage against the United States because they have nothing to really charge him with,” Oklahoma Sen. James Lankford, a member of the Intelligence Committee, said on Fox News.
Lankford was referring to Andrew Brunson, an American pastor who was arrested in the aftermath of the 2015 attempt to overthrow Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Brunson’s detention is the latest flashpoint in U.S-Turkish relations, which have simmered in recent years despite the fact that the two sides are bound together as NATO allies.
“I think Turkey believes they’re going to get something by holding Andrew Brunson; what they’re going to get from us is sanctions against their government,” Lankford said. “What we need to do is be able to impose sanctions against the individual judges, against the individual prosecutors, against the government and individuals in Ankara’s government that are actually holding an American with trumped up charges, for a year with no charges at all, and so we need to forcefully respond.”
Turkish officials have accused Brunson of working with Fetullah Gulen, a Turkish cleric whom Erdogan has accused of orchestrating the 2015 coup attempt. “I’ve never done anything against Turkey,” Brunson told a Turkish court on Monday, per the New York Times. “I love Turkey. I’ve been praying for Turkey for 25 years. I want truth to come out.”
Erdogan wants the United States to extradite Gulen, who lives in Pennsylvania, but successive U.S. administrations have declined to do so. “If Turkey believes that somehow they have leverage to be able to pull someone out, that has legal status here in the United States, to be able to pull them back to Turkey, they’re absolutely incorrect on that,” Lankford said. “These cases have nothing to do with each other.”
Turkey may also face sanctions if Erdogan, who has alarmed Western allies with his authoritarian policies and burgeoning relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin, proceeds with the purchase of Russian air-defense missiles systems. Such arms deals are subject to U.S. punishment under the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act, or CAATSA, the 2017 sanctions law that targets Russia’s defense industry.
“We have been very clear that if a transaction occurs, there will be consequences under CAATSA,” Assistant Secretary of State Wess Mitchell told the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Wednesday. “We’ve also been clear with regard to the consequences for potential participation in the F-35 program and more broadly our military-industrial cooperation with Turkey.”
