[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 163 (2017), Part 7]
[Senate]
[Pages 9111-9112]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                            RUSSIA SANCTIONS

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, last night Senators reached a bipartisan 
agreement on a package of Russia sanctions for the Senate to vote on as 
an amendment to the pending Iran sanctions.
  It was the result of several days of negotiations and hard work. The 
Republican leader and I spent a lot of time on this, and I thank him 
for that, as did Senators Crapo, Brown, Cardin, Corker, Shaheen, 
Durbin, and Menendez. I thank each of them for their efforts and their 
expertise in getting this done.
  In particular, I thank Senator Cardin, ranking member of the Foreign 
Relations Committee, who is one of the most trusted voices in our 
caucus on this issue. He did an excellent job of forging a bipartisan 
consensus on this committee with little regard for the credit he would 
receive. I also want to thank Senator Brown, our ranking member on 
Banking, who has been steadfast in making sure we would get a good, 
effective sanctions bill done. We wouldn't have done this also without 
Senators Shaheen, Durbin, Menendez, and their staffs. I thank all of 
them.
  The final result of these negotiations is a good result for our 
country. By codifying the existing sanctions and requiring 
congressional review of any decision to weaken or lift them, we are 
ensuring that the United States continues to punish President Putin for 
his reckless and destabilizing actions. I believe it is particularly 
significant that a bipartisan coalition is seeking to reestablish 
Congress as a final arbiter of sanctions relief, no matter what the 
administration does, particularly,

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considering that this administration has been too eager to put 
sanctions relief on the table. These additional sanctions will also 
send a powerful and bipartisan statement to Russia and any other 
country that might try to interfere in our elections that they will be 
punished, and Congress will stand firm in making sure they are 
punished, Democrats and Republicans.
  Again, I thank my Republican and Democratic colleagues for putting 
party aside, for doing what is best for the country. I hope this 
agreement quickly passes both the House and Senate, and we hope the 
President will sign this legislation as well, even though it cedes the 
power to Congress.

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