(CNN) — Bipartisan senators announced an agreement with the Trump administration on Friday to move ahead with an updated Russia sanctions package, but it remains unclear if President Donald Trump will directly back the bill’s passage.
The package would allow Trump to place heavy tariffs on imports from nations that import Russian oil, uranium and natural gas, with possible exceptions for countries that contribute to the Ukrainian war effort. Last summer, GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham and Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal were pushing for the package. Trump signaled he was open to the idea and expressed disappointment in Russian President Vladimir Putin’s attitude toward negotiations, but the administration did not come out in support of the bill.
Graham and Blumenthal, who have been leading the push for this bill for years, released a statement on Friday alongside Senate Armed Services Chairman Roger Wicker and Senate Foreign Relations Ranking Member Jeanne Shaheen stating, “We are proud to announce that we have reached an agreement with the Trump Administration to move our updated Russia sanctions legislation forward. We are very pleased with this significant progress and expect to roll out the legislation very soon.”
CNN has reached out to the White House for comment.
Graham visited Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Friday in Kyiv.
“Right now, it is important to strengthen our long-range sanction pressure on Russia with new sanction steps from our partners. Lindsey informed me about the work in Congress on the relevant bill,” Zelensky said in a social media post after the meeting.
Graham and Blumenthal have long had vast bipartisan support for Russia sanctions, including a package with over 80 Senate cosponsors from both parties. However, Senate Majority Leader John Thune has maintained the Senate will follow the White House’s lead on the issue and won’t bring the sanctions bill to the floor until they are certain of the administration’s backing, despite previous comments by Graham that the administration approves of the bill.
CNN has reached out to Thune’s office for comment.
The calendar is also a factor; the Senate is staring down several must-pass pieces of legislation, including the annual defense policy package and another government funding deadline, with only a handful of weeks in session between now and the midterm elections.
The deal for a sanctions package would come on the heels of an announcement by Trump allowing Ukraine to build Patriot defense missile batteries, something the country desperately needs as Russia continues its attacks.
The announcement came as a surprise on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Turkey this week, even though Ukraine has been working on the issue for years, and there were some indications a deal could be close. Sat next to Trump during the announcement, Zelensky at times looked like he almost couldn’t believe his luck. The two men share a rocky relationship and the flareup in the war in Iran appeared to have put Trump into a foul mood just before his meeting.
The-CNN-Wire
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