On February 4, Donald Trump signed a National Security Presidential Memorandum on the subject of "Imposing Maximum Pressure on the Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Denying Iran All Paths to a Nuclear Weapon, and Countering Iran’s Malign Influence." On Monday, the United States State Department issued a number of sanctions on Iran's oil trade and "entities that have traded in Iran’s petroleum."
State department spokesperson Tammy Bruce issued the following statement:
The U.S. Department of State is today designating 16 entities and vessels for their involvement in Iran’s petroleum and petrochemical industry.
The Department of State and the Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) are concurrently sanctioning a combined total of 22 persons and identifying 13 vessels as blocked property, across multiple jurisdictions, for their involvement in Iran’s oil industry.
This network of illicit shipping facilitators obfuscates and deceives its role in loading and transporting Iranian oil for sale to buyers in Asia. It has shipped tens of millions of barrels of crude oil worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Today’s action represents an initial step to realize President Trump’s campaign of maximum pressure on the Iranian regime. It disrupts efforts by Iran to amass oil revenues to fund terrorists’ activities.
We will continue to disrupt such illicit funding streams for Iran’s malign activities. As long as Iran devotes its energy revenues to financing attacks on our allies, supporting terrorism around the world, or pursuing other destabilizing actions, we will use all the tools at our disposal to hold the regime accountable.
The Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) is also working with the State Department. "Iran continues to rely on a shadowy network of vessels, shippers, and brokers to facilitate its oil sales and fund its destabilizing activities," said Scott Bessent, the secretary of the Treasury. He added, "The United States will use all our available tools to target all aspects of Iran’s oil supply chain, and anyone who deals in Iranian oil exposes themselves to significant sanctions risk."
According to a press release from the Treasury Department, "Among those sanctioned today are oil brokers in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Hong Kong, tanker operators and managers in India and People’s Republic of China (PRC), the head of Iran’s National Iranian Oil Company, and the Iranian Oil Terminals Company, whose operations help finance Iran’s destabilizing activities. The vessels sanctioned today are responsible for shipping tens of millions of barrels of crude oil valued in the hundreds of millions of dollars."
During an interview with Catherine Herridge on Thursday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio was adamant that there will never be a nuclear Iran because they would "hold the world hostage" and "potentially attack Israel." While he wouldn't get into the specific tactics that the United States plans to use to prevent that, he did say "that if the United States chose to do so, it could bring about the end of the Iranian regime."
Related: Marco Rubio Sits Down for an Actual Intelligent Interview
But he added, "The president's a peacemaker. He'd prefer to avoid that and avoid those circumstances. But I don't think anyone should be confused here. Under Donald Trump, there is not going to be a nuclear Iran."
According to Fox News, "The U.S. Department of Justice last year charged the Islamic Republic with an assassination attempt against Trump, presumably in retaliation for the military strike that eliminated IRGC General Qassem Soleimani in 2020. Iran's president, however, denied the claim during an interview with NBC News' Lester Holt in Tehran."