Toomey: We Need Secondary Sanctions on Russian Banks So China Doesn’t Undercut Sanctions

On Tuesday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Your World,” Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA) argued that we need to put secondary sanctions on Russian banks to keep China from undercutting American sanctions.

Toomey stated, “Well, there’s an easy way to prevent that…to impose secondary sanctions on Russian banks. And what — the way the secondary sanction works is, it’s a very simple proposition that we establish — we, the United States. And that is, if you’re a bank anywhere in the world, you can do business with Russia if you want, but then you can’t do business with the United States. There are no major international banks that are going to decide they’d rather do business with Russia than the United States. That’s how you isolate the Russian economy. That’s how you bring it to its knees.”

He added, “That does go after China, directly, Neil. Because if the Chinese banks were then to provide financing through whatever mechanism they choose, then they would be subject to that sanction just as any other bank would. By the way, I don’t think China can replace the demand for Russian petroleum products that the west purchases. That’s part of the reason why we have to shut down our purchases of Russian energy.”

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