Monday, April 16, 2018

Trump Throws Nikki Haley Under the Russian Sanctions Bus



As the Trump World turns.

The Washington Post reports:
President Trump on Monday put the brakes on a preliminary plan to impose additional economic sanctions on Russia, walking back a Sunday announcement by U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley that the Kremlin had swiftly denounced as “international economic raiding.”

Preparations to punish Russia anew for its support of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s government over the alleged chemical weapons attack in Syria caused consternation at the White House. Haley had said on CBS News’s “Face the Nation” that sanctions on Russian companies behind the equipment related to Assad’s alleged chemical weapons attack would be announced Monday by Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin.

But Trump conferred with his national security advisers later Sunday and told them he was upset the sanctions were being officially rolled out because he was not yet comfortable executing them, according to several people familiar with the plan.
As The Daily Beast notes:
 It was unlikely that Haley...would have misspoken so egregiously if a sanctions regime was not already in the works.
All indications are that Trump is waffling on yet another issue and things will end based on who talks to him last. With Peter Navarro and neocons all around him, Trump is likely to eventually give the go ahead on the sanctions.

-Robert Wenzel  

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