A bipartisan group of six US senators has urged Donald Trump to abandon a plan to import Russian diesel, warning that the move would provide Vladimir Putin with financial support while his forces continue attacking Ukraine.
The senators said the administration should “immediately reverse course” after Mr Trump announced that Russia would supply more than 300,000 tons of diesel to the American and global markets, with further shipments planned in November and beyond.
The proposed deal, announced by Mr Trump after a telephone conversation with the Russian president on Friday, is intended to ease soaring fuel prices in the United States. But its opponents say it conflicts with laws passed by Congress to prevent American money from helping finance Russia’s war.
Four Republicans – Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, Thom Tillis and John Curtis – joined Democrats Jeanne Shaheen and Richard Blumenthal in condemning the plan.
“The United States should not provide Putin with a financial lifeline while Russia continues to kill Ukrainian civilians,” they said in a joint statement. “The Administration must immediately reverse course.”
The senators also accused the White House of failing to consult Congress or provide the explanation required under US law before moving to ease restrictions on Russian energy.
Dispute over Russian energy sanctions
Congress banned Russian energy imports in 2022 after Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. More recently, lawmakers passed legislation requiring substantial tariffs on major importers of Russian oil or gas, subject to limited exemptions.
“Congress was clear: the US should not import oil from Russia until it ends its aggression against Ukraine and ceases threats against our NATO allies,” the senators said. They argued that allowing Russian diesel into the country ran directly counter to that policy.
Mr Tillis told NBC’s Meet the Press that there was a “legitimate case” that the president would be acting unlawfully if the purchase plan went ahead.
“We were very clear that Russia is the aggressor. Russia is the one who can end this war by backing out of territory that they occupied,” he said.
But Senator John Barrasso, a Republican from Wyoming, defended Mr Trump’s authority to make difficult decisions in response to high energy costs. Appearing on CBS’s Face the Nation, he said the president was “balancing” competing priorities and urged him to use the sanctions legislation as leverage against Mr Putin.
“This is just another point of leverage for the president to use against Putin in an effort to get a long-term solution in that part of the world,” Mr Barrasso said.
Energy analysts have questioned whether the proposed imports would make any meaningful difference to American prices. Richard Nephew, a senior research scholar at Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy, said the quantities announced appeared to be less than the amount of diesel consumed in the United States in a single day.
Michael Lynch, of the Energy Policy Research Foundation, said diverting Russian diesel to the US would largely force existing customers to find supplies elsewhere, limiting any effect on the wider market.
The dispute comes as diesel prices have risen sharply in the United States, increasing transport and delivery costs for businesses and consumers. The timing has placed additional pressure on the Trump administration to bring down energy prices ahead of November’s midterm elections.
