The House of Representatives passed on April 16 its second batch of measures to combat the Iranian threat following Tehran’s unprecedented attack on Israel over the weekend.
The second round consisted of seven bills and two resolutions.
Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), Cori Bush (D-Mo.), and Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) voted against it.
The measure would “require the secretary of the Treasury to report on financial institutions’ involvement with officials of the Iranian government, and for other purposes.”
“Iran has developed covert methods for accessing the international financial system and pursuing its malign activities, including misusing banks and exchange houses, operating procurement networks that utilize front or shell companies, exploiting commercial shipping, and masking illicit transactions using senior officials, including those at the Central Bank of Iran (CBI),” said the Treasury Department upon designating the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist group in 2019.
The Iran Sanctions Accountability Act of 2023 passed 408-13.
Ms. Omar, Ms. Tlaib, Mr. Massie, Ms. Bush, and Reps. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.), Greg Casar (D-Texas), Chuy Garcia (D-Ill.), Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), Summer Lee (D-Pa.), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.), and Delia Ramirez (D-Ill.) voted against it.
The legislation would “require the president to prevent the abuse of financial sanctions exemptions by Iran, and for other purposes.”
It passed 419 to 4, with Reps. Bush, Omar, Massie, and Tlaib voting No.
Hamas is also known to use civilians as human shields in trying to prevent Israeli military action in Gaza, which the terrorist group supports.
It would “provide for the imposition of sanctions with respect to illicit captagon trafficking.” Captagon is a widely-illicit and deadly drug mass-produced in Syria, where Hezbollah has a strong presence and whose activities include drug trafficking. The bill would crack down by imposing sanctions and visa restrictions on those involved.
Captagon is a major source of revenue for the Syrian regime under Bashar al-Assad.
It would “require a report on sanctions under the Robert Levinson Hostage Recovery and Hostage-Taking Accountability Act, and for other purposes.”
That law, named for the former FBI agent who went missing in Iran and is assumed dead, outlines requirements that would allow the secretary of State to deem if someone is wrongfully detained abroad.
The measure would make it “the policy of the United States to undertake additional actions and impose strict penalties to deter the government of Iran and other hostile governments and non-state actors from hostage-taking or wrongfully detaining United States nationals.” Iran has a record of wrongfully taking people, including Americans, hostage.
It would “repeal the sunset provision of the Iran Sanctions Act of 1996, and for other purposes.” That law, notes the bill, “requires the imposition of sanctions with respect to Iran’s illicit weapons programs, conventional weapons, and ballistic missile development, and support for terrorism, including” the IRGC.
The resolution states that the phrase is “a call for ”the eradication of the State of Israel, which is located between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea“ and ”seeks to deny Jewish people the right to self-determination and calls for the removal of the Jewish people from their ancestral homeland.”