FOREIGN POLICY/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT/VENEZUELA: “The Trump administration said it was prepared to impose ‘strong and swift’ economic sanctions on Venezuela, including banning its crude-oil exports to the U.S., if its president moves ahead with a plan to rewrite the country’s constitution.
A senior U.S. administration official said Tuesday [7-18-17] that the White House was considering moving beyond its current strategy of targeting sanctions against particular individuals and companies to take punitive action to hit the country where it would hurt the most: the international crude sales that provide the vast majority of the funding for the government and the economy.
President Nicolás Maduro plans to hold a national election on July 30 to pick a new constituent assembly with the power to rewrite the constitution, bypassing the existing congress under the opposition’s control.
‘We can promise that whatever actions we choose to take after July 30th will be strong, swift and deliberate,’ the official said on a conference call with journalists. ‘All options are on the table, all options are being discussed and debated.’
That includes a potential prohibition on crude and other petroleum product trade with the country, the official said, even if such an action could deal a crushing blow to the Venezuelan economy and trouble U.S. markets.”
-Ian Talley and Kejal Vyas, “U.S. Prepared to Sanction Venezuela, Including Possible Ban on Oil Imports,” The Wall Street Journal online, July 18, 2017 07:03pm