Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin confirmed that foreign companies who do business in Iran can expect penalties from the Trump administration.
Mnuchin made the remarks Tuesday before a Senate appropriations subcommittee, noting that he and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo have already warned US allies.
“The Iran sanctions will go back in place, both the primary sanctions and the secondary sanctions,” Mnuchin told Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.).
“And yes we’ve already communicated with our European partners, both through Secretary Pompeo and myself, that we will be enforcing the secondary sanctions,” he added.
Earlier this month, when President Trump announced he would be violating the nuclear deal with Iran, Mnuchin immediately raised the likelihood of penalizing US allies, as a result. In a statement released on May 8, the Treasury Department noted the President had augmented “both our primary and secondary sanctions authorities.”
On Monday, German Economic Minister Peter Altmaier confirmed that German citizens doing business in Iran should prepare for the worst.
“We will help where we can, but there is no way of completely averting the consequences of this unilateral withdrawal,” said Altmaier.
In response to Mnuchin’s testimony on Tuesday, Coons said he was concerned about alienating longtime friends of the United States “at a critical moment.”
The lawmaker noted, however, that he backed the Trump administration’s “broader objective of restraining, [and] hopefully ending Iran’s aggressive and bad behavior.”
In March, Coons was one of ten Democrats to oppose legislation that would have forced the US to stop supporting Saudi Arabia’s invasion and blockade of Yemen. Lawmakers supporting the operations have dismissed international condemnation of Saudi atrocities by claiming Iranian influence is responsible for the conflict.
