"These concerns led some department officials to also reach out to Malinowski, an Obama political appointee who had just stepped down. Malinowski said he, like Fried, called Cardin and other congressional allies, including aides to Sen. John McCain, and urged them to codify the sanctions — effectively locking them in place — before Trump could lift them

The lobbying effort produced some immediate results: On Feb. 7, Cardin and Sen. Lindsay Graham introduced bipartisan legislation to bar the administration from granting sanctions relief without first submitting a proposal to do so for congressional review. “Russia has done nothing to be rewarded with sanctions relief,” Graham said in a statement at the time. If the U.S. were to lift sanctions without “verifiable progress” by Russia in living up to agreements in Ukraine, “we would lose all credibility in the eyes of our allies in Europe and around he world,” added Cardin in his own statement. (A spokesman for Cardin told Yahoo News in an emailed statement: “I can also confirm that the senator did hear from senior Obama officials encouraging him to take sanctions steps, but that he had already been considering it as well.”)

The proposed bill lost some of its urgency six days later when Flynn resigned as White House national security adviser following disclosures he had discussed political sanctions relief with Kislyak during the transition and misrepresented those talks to Vice President Mike Pence. After that, “it didn’t take too long for it to become clear that if they lifted sanctions, there would be a political firestorm,” Malinowski said.

But the political battles over the issue are far from over. Cardin, McCain and Graham are separately pushing another sanctions bill — imposing tough new measures in response to Russia’s election interference. The measures have so far been blocked for consideration within the Senate Foreign Relations Committee by its chairman, Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., who says he wants to first hear the administration’s position on the issue.

their concentration was here?


Unknown to the public at the time, top Trump administration officials, almost as soon as they took office, tasked State Department staffers with developing proposals for the lifting of economic sanctions, the return of diplomatic compounds and other steps to relieve tensions with Moscow.

Former gov official Dan Fried who worked 40 years under Repubs and Dems discussed how he heard from State Dept staffers who were alarmed over the rush by Trump WH to so quickly unilaterally remove the sanctions without Russia having to do anything in return- on Rachel Maddow show with Ari Melber

I think this article is one of the most important ones written yet on Trump-Russia. Reason below by Caroline O.

This is a truly stunning report by @Isikoff. It connects pre-election talks w/Kislyak to concrete plans by the Trump WH to lift sanctions.

Link to tweet

And then senators passed a bill to hold sanctions unless they are contacted first, then they KNOW Trump was making deals/colluded...and they do nothing about it?? They are just as complicit unless they are waiting for all the evidence to come in...but who has a spine...come on...

any guesses on what Spicer's new spin will be?

He'll pass the buck to the lawyers like he did yesterday.

Anything Russian related goes to them.

What a bunch of traitorous cowards.

when they fixed their platform to included Russia friendly reach-arounds.

But few wanted to take it seriously. Most were too busy obsessing over NOTHING, namely Hillary's emails.