Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) introduced legislation Wednesday that would impose tariffs on countries that buy crude oil or petroleum products from Iran, Jewish Insider has learned.

Graham unveiled the Tariffs for Terrorism Act following months of discussions with former President Donald Trump about ways to build on their efforts to deprive Iran of its oil revenues. If implemented, the tariffs would serve as an obstacle to Tehran being able to export their petroleum to countries that engage with the United States.

“After many discussions with President Trump, I’m introducing legislation to impose tariffs on countries that purchase petroleum products from Iran,” Graham told JI in a statement on the bill.

“It is long past time to make those that enrich this terrorist regime pay a price, and there’s no better price than tariffs on products coming into the United States,” he continued. “On day one, President Trump will re-impose maximum pressure on Iran. Tariffs on countries that empower terrorism and the Ayatollah is a good place to start.”

Iran uses its oil profits to fund terrorism and its expanding nuclear program, the latter of which Secretary of State Tony Blinken revealed last week had narrowed its nuclear breakout time, or how long it takes to produce enough weapons-grade uranium to produce a nuclear bomb, to approximately one to two weeks.

Graham has long argued that one of the most effective ways to combat rising Iranian aggression toward the U.S. would be to isolate the country economically. He noted back in June that Iran, the world’s largest state sponsor of terrorism, had been “enriched dramatically” by oil sales in recent years, and that sanctions “are either being evaded by Iran or not being enforced by the Biden Administration.”

“China is buying oil below market price from Iran and so are other countries, buying weapons and enriching this terrorist state,” Graham said at the time. “Sanctions are important but they’ve been evaded way too often. So we’re proposing a tariff on any country who buys oil from Iran, because they’re buying oil below market price which gives their economy an advantage over ours. Nobody understands how to use tariffs better than President Trump.”

“One way to deal with this problem is to tell anybody and everybody, if you buy oil from the Iranians, then you’re going to have a tariff placed on your products when it comes to the United States. We have to hit Iran in the pocketbook,” he added.

Read more on original:

https://jewishinsider.com/2024/07/graham-introduces-legislation-to-place-tariffs-on-countries-that-buy-oil-from-iran/#:~:text=%E2%80%9CAfter%20many%20discussions%20with%20President,a%20statement%20on%20the%20bill.