Donald Trump blocked several congressionally approved Russia sanctions on Friday night, two days before they were due to take effect, deepening a public dispute with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Trump issued an executive order suspending sanctions that he had signed into law in September. The law gave Trump broad powers to levy tariffs of up to 100 percent on imports from the top five purchasers of Russian oil and gas, most significantly China and India. It also imposed sanctions on senior Russian officials including Vladimir Putin, Russian financial institutions, and Russia's "shadow fleet" of vessels used to circumvent existing embargoes. Trump's order waived many of these provisions.
Trump said the suspension served the US "national interest." Russian envoy Kirill Dmitriev called the waiver "an important and truly historic moment" and argued the sanctions would have caused "serious damage" primarily to the US and global markets.
US lawmakers criticized the decision. Virginia Congressman Don Beyer posted on X that "Trump's latest surrender to Putin again betrays our Ukrainian partners and defies clear congressional intent."
Zelensky said on Saturday that the sanctions "could have helped enormously" and that the law was "supposed to impose truly effective pressure on Russia to bring this war to an end." He told reporters he believed Trump would lift additional sanctions against Russia. He said negotiators from both Ukraine and the US spoke on Friday and could meet next week.
The sanctions waiver follows a wider deterioration in US-Ukraine relations. Last week Trump suspended some sanctions to import Russian diesel to lower US energy prices. Zelensky suggested this amounted to US investment in Russia's war effort. Trump later claimed both Russia and Ukraine had agreed to an "energy ceasefire" to facilitate Russian diesel exports. Zelensky initially said Ukraine would stop striking Russian energy infrastructure if Russia did the same, but resumed attacks after three days of continued Russian strikes. Trump called the Ukrainian strikes a "disgrace." Zelensky responded that he was "only standing up for Ukraine's interests."
Concerns intensified after Starlink, a US-provided satellite system used by Ukraine, suddenly restricted drone speeds last week, disrupting battlefield missions. Zelensky told reporters Ukrainian officials said technical issues caused the restriction, but Ukrainian testing on EU territory found "these problems do not exist" and the system operated at higher speeds. Trump has denied deliberately slowing Ukraine's Starlink network.
Russian strikes on 15 Ukrainian energy facilities overnight caused power cuts in several regions ahead of winter.