WASHINGTON -- The Trump administration is preparing to impose new sanctions on powerful Russian business and political figures under a law passed last year in response to alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 election.
Three officials said Thursday that the Treasury Department would implement the sanctions under the Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act, which was overwhelmingly passed by Congress in 2017 and signed into law by President Donald Trump despite some objections.
The law aims to punish Russia for interfering in the U.S. election as well as actions intended to subvert democracy in Europe. The law also authorizes the president to impose sanctions on Iran for destabilizing activity in the Middle East and North Korea for its nuclear and ballistic missile programs.
The officials would not say how many or which Russians would be hit by the sanctions, which are expected to be announced early today. But they noted that a number of Russian oligarchs, politicians and affiliated businesses have already been identified by the Treasury and State Department as potential targets. Two officials said the sanctions would affect at least some those who appeared on that list, which was compiled and published in January. Last month, the U.S. targeted 19 Russians and five other entities with sanctions in the first use of the law.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss the actions ahead of the announcement, which is expected early today. An interagency team was briefed on the outlines of the announcement on Wednesday, they said. The sanctions will freeze any assets that those targeted have in U.S. jurisdictions and bar Americans from doing business with them.
The State Department declined to comment.
The administration is trying to satisfy pressure from Congress to act on a sanctions law passed last summer, a U.S. government official said. The U.S. in January identified 210 wealthy Russians, top officials and business leaders for a list required under the law. The targets for the sanctions will be taken from a classified annex to the report, the official said.
Trump has been criticized by Republicans and Democrats for doing little to punish Russia for interfering in the U.S. election and for being slow to act on the sanctions law. An investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller into whether Trump's campaign colluded with the Russian government has cast a shadow over his presidency, though Trump denies the accusation.
During a news conference Tuesday with Baltic leaders, Trump argued that his administration is taking action.
"Nobody has been tougher on Russia than I have," Trump said.
White House officials have noted that the administration has expelled dozens of Russian diplomats and shut down two Russian consulates in response to Russian behavior, including the poisoning of an ex-spy in Britain that has been blamed on Moscow.
Trump's national security team has pressed for stronger action against Russian President Vladimir Putin after the nerve-agent poisoning of a former Russian spy in the U.K. The U.S. expelled 60 Russian diplomats in a response to the poisoning coordinated with the U.K. and European allies.
The U.S. announced sanctions March 15 on a St. Petersburg-based "troll farm" and other Russian citizens and entities Mueller indicted in February for interfering in the U.S. election. That sanctions list also targeted individuals and entities the administration said were involved in cyberattacks, including the 2017 NotPetya attack, described as the most damaging in history.
Trump's outgoing national security adviser, H.R. McMaster, publicly called for a tougher line against Russia in a speech Tuesday, saying in the face of Putin's increasing aggression around the world, "We have failed to impose sufficient costs."
Asked about the planned sanctions, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Thursday: "The phrase 'Russian oligarchs' is considered inappropriate. The time when there were oligarchs in Russia passed long ago, there are no oligarchs in Russia."
Information for this article was contributed by Matthew Lee and Zeke Miller of The Associated Press and by Saleha Mohsin and Ilya Arkhipov of Bloomberg News.
A Section on 04/06/2018