U.S. President Donald Trump’s inclination towards Russian President Vladimir Putin was put on full display yet again this past week through numerous means — and now, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin has followed that up with a pro-Russia move of his own.
Speaking to Reuters this past week, he revealed the United States to be working towards lifting the sanctions on Rusal, a large Russian aluminum producer. The sanctions were originally put in place in April as part of the U.S. response to Russian meddling in the 2016 election cycle and targeted Rusal because of Putin connected Oleg Deripaska’s stake in it.
The businessman is intertwined with the Russian election meddling scandal; among other issues, he gave the currently jailed former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort a $10 million loan that has been scrutinized by Special Counsel for the Russia investigation Robert Mueller.
In the time since the sanctions were imposed earlier this year, Deripaska’s control of the company has shrunk. He stepped back from its board of directors in June, when a new board dominated by independent directors and operational managers was elected, and Reuters reports Deripaska and some of his top managers to be currently exploring how to further distance him from the company.
That shift is the change that the U.S. Treasury Department has previously stated was necessary before a consideration of lifting the sanctions.
Now, Mnuchin tells Reuters:
‘The company has approached us on certain de-listing issues (from the Specially Designated Nationals List). I’m not going to go into the exact specifics of what those proposals are and where we stand on them, but, yes, if we can find an acceptable solution, that is our objective. Our objective is not to put Rusal out of business.’
Mnuchin previously commented that the U.S. was not “targeting the hardworking people who depend on RUSAL and its subsidiaries,” so now, it seems as though he’s closer to making good on that promise. He delivered that past statement in connection to his agency’s decision to extend the period for interests to wind down business with the company — a period that may soon prove to have been for nothing should sanctions be lifted.
Ironically, were the sanctions on Rusal to be lifted, the moves that the Trump administration has actually gotten around to taking to counter Russian aggression would begin to be dialed back. There’s not much hope that the administration would rush to readjust their policies to keep up the pressure.
Trump claimed while standing next to Putin in Helinski, Finland, recently to see no reason to believe that his country had been behind meddling in the 2016 U.S. elections, before eventually backtracking. He seemed to claim later that Russian meddling was not an ongoing threat, before his press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders had to clean up that mess too.
In other words, rather than easing the sanctions on Rusal proving to be a one-off thing, the prospect comes as a part of a long line of turning a blind eye to Russian activities despite the fact that the threat of election meddling has not gone away.
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