During a town hall on CNN on Friday, United States Ambassador to the U.N. Michael Waltz defended the Trump administration lifting sanctions on some Iranian oil by saying that “much of that oil and that illicit oil is already out there. It’s already out there in the system. So, we’re going to allow it to go, [on] a temporary basis, to some of our allies, like India, Japan, and others, so that this strategy from Iran, the Iranian regime doesn’t work. And, by the way, this is a president who put maximum pressure on the Iranian regime in his first term.”
Moderator Dana Bash asked, “I have to ask about something that just happened tonight. The U.S. lifted sanctions on 140 million barrels of Iranian oil. The U.S. lifted sanctions on Iran. So, just to be clear, the administration is now allowing Iran, the country that it is at war with, to sell its oil, make money, and almost certainly use that money in its war against the U.S. Why?”
Waltz answered, “Dana, I think you have to tell the rest of that story. That’s a little bit misleading. The measure is targeted towards oil that’s already out there on ships, already out there in storage, and, to the previous question, is very temporary, to allow — to basically defeat the Iranian strategy of driving energy prices so high, causing pain on consumers all over the world, so that –.”
Bash then cut in to ask, “And money will go into their coffers?”
Waltz responded, “Well, that — much of that oil and that illicit oil is already out there. It’s already out there in the system. So, we’re going to allow it to go, [on] a temporary basis, to some of our allies, like India, Japan, and others, so that this strategy from Iran, the Iranian regime doesn’t work. And, by the way, this is a president who put maximum pressure on the Iranian regime in his first term. It was lifted by Biden, in this Iran deal 2.0 attempt that Biden put in place. President Trump, as his second national security measure, put that maximum pressure back on. Their currency is tanking, their foreign currency reserves are tanking. The thing the regime cares about the most is control and its money. And so, no one can accuse President Trump of not putting maximum pressure on, not only this regime, but on the Russian economy as well.”
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