Legislation that would provide additional assistance to Ukraine by tapping into Russian assets frozen in the United States has been reintroduced in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives.
The Rebuilding Economic Prosperity and Opportunity for Ukrainians Act was introduced on June 15 in both chambers. It would give the U.S. president the authority to confiscate Russian assets frozen in the United States and transfer them to help Ukraine.
Senator Jim Risch (Republican-Idaho), ranking Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, is a sponsor of the bill, which was originally introduced last year in the Senate but failed to gain support from Democrats. The bill now has the backing of Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (Democrat-Rhode Island), who is co-sponsoring the bill in the Senate.
“Over a year into Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine, more than $300 billion in Russian sovereign assets remain frozen globally,” said Risch. “Given Russia’s brutality and continued war crimes against the Ukrainian people, it is only right that Russian government funds in the United States be seized and repurposed to help Ukraine rebuild its country."
Whitehouse said in the news release that it will cost hundreds of billions of dollars to rebuild Ukraine’s economy after the war.
"It only makes sense that Putin’s Russian regime should foot that bill,” he said.
The bill also has bipartisan support in the House, where its sponsors are Representative Michael McCaul (Republican-Texas), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and Representative Marcy Kaptur (Democrat-Ohio), co-chair of the Congressional Ukraine Caucus.
The bill is "critical to ensuring justice for Ukraine," McCaul said, adding that the legislation also signals to other adversaries that if they want to continue to trading their goods on international markets, namely in dollars, euros, and yen, they cannot launch an unprovoked aggression.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy thanked the congressmen for reintroducing the bill.
When Russia's leaders and all Russians whose collaboration with the Kremlin created the conditions for Russian aggression lose their money, "a very important goal will be achieved. They will feel what a loss is," Zelenskiy said in his evening address on June 15.
Frozen Russian assets should be used for the benefit of the people who suffered from Russia's aggression and for the benefit of the Ukrainian state and people, he added.
