The facts
President Donald Trump has put on hold a sweeping new sanctions package targeting the Russian economy, telling Congress the pause on the legislation passed by both chambers was in the national interest. In an executive order on Friday, the US president said he was waiving many sanctions, restrictions, and duties on Russia. This move comes as Trump has been publicly criticizing Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy, including suggesting that Ukraine needs a new leader. Trump signed the legislation last month after Congress passed the measure in an act of rare bipartisan agreement. The legislation sought to clamp down more quickly on the flow of financial resources fueling Russia’s war against Ukraine. The legislation, whose primary backer in Congress was the late senator Lindsey Graham, sanctions Russian officials, banks, and a shadow fleet of tankers that keeps Russian energy moving and was due to be implemented in two days. It also directs Trump to impose up to 100% tariffs on the top five importers of Russian oil or natural gas, with an exception for countries that import less than 15% of Russia’s natural gas exports and have taken significant steps to reduce those imports. Friday’s announcement comes a week after Trump said the US had agreed to purchase diesel from Russia to try to bring down global energy prices, upending years of US and western pressure on the Kremlin to end its war against Ukraine. Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Friday the diesel deal would mean cash will start flowing back into Russia, as he met European leaders in Brussels. Trump blindsided Zelenskyy last weekend by announcing that Ukraine and Russia had agreed not to target each other’s energy facilities. Facing midterm elections next month, Trump has blamed Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries for pushing up energy prices that could cost his Republican party its thin majorities in the US Senate and House of Representatives.
Our take
Donald Trump, the human embodiment of a self-inflicted dick punch, has decided the national interest is best served by deep-throating the Russian war machine while telling the country fighting it to get fucked. In a staggering display of geopolitical cuntery, the president signed a sanctions bill only to immediately waive most of it, essentially using Congress’s own legislation as toilet paper before flushing it directly into the Kremlin’s coffers. His primary concern isn’t stopping a fascist invasion; it’s making sure gas is cheap enough that American voters don’t hold his party’s flaccid, thin majority accountable at the ballot box. What a brave fucking leader, prioritizing his own political ass over the literal survival of a democratic ally. The move is so transparently corrupt it makes a shadow fleet of oil tankers look like a goddamn parade float. The legislation, championed by the late Senator Lindsey Graham - who is presumably spinning in his grave at a velocity capable of powering the Eastern seaboard - was designed to strangle the financial nutsack of Putin’s war. Trump’s response? To not only refuse to squeeze, but to start tenderly massaging it by announcing the US will buy Russian diesel. This isn’t a policy shift; it’s a goddamn fetish. He’s so desperate to suckle at the teat of cheap fossil fuels he’s willing to fund the very bombs falling on Ukrainian cities. Then this prick has the audacity to ‘blindside’ Zelenskyy by inventing a bullshit truce on energy facilities and publicly musing that maybe Ukraine should just get a new president. The sheer, unmitigated gall of this asshole, blaming Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries for his own domestic political peril, is a masterclass in narcissistic cowardice. He’s not a statesman; he’s a petulant, greedy toddler who thinks foreign policy is a game of ‘how can I personally avoid getting my shit pushed in next month.’ The only thing he’s sanctioning is his own pathetic legacy as the dickhead who chose Putin over principle, every single time. Fuck him, and fuck this weak, self-serving bullshit. He’s not pausing sanctions in the national interest; he’s pausing them in the interest of one bloated, orange national disgrace.
