Senator Seeks Sanctions Against Colombian Leader, Associates
Sen. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, has been working with the Treasury Department to sanction Colombia's President Gustavo Petro and his "associates and enablers" for their suspected role in drug trafficking, the lawmaker said late Oct. 22.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
If your job depends on informed compliance, you need International Trade Today. Delivered every business day and available any time online, only International Trade Today helps you stay current on the increasingly complex international trade regulatory environment.
In a hallway interview at the Capitol, Moreno also said he has been working with the Trump administration to designate additional drug cartels as Foreign Terrorist Organizations and investigate how Petro allegedly received drug money to fund his 2022 election.
Moreno, who was born in Colombia, said it is “pretty well-known” in the South American country that Petro “received significant sums of money from the drug cartels to get elected.” Petro also has “enriched his family, so we’re going to get to the bottom of that,” the senator told Export Compliance Daily.
“And then obviously, some of these drug cartels, we have to designate them because there's a lot of them down there that haven't gotten the technical designations, so we’re going to do that as well,” Moreno added.
Moreno, a member of the Senate Banking Committee (see 2412230073), said he believes all of the steps he mentioned can be taken administratively and without legislative action. But he is considering introducing a resolution to allow Congress to weigh in on the matter.
The State, Treasury and Justice departments and the Colombian embassy in Washington didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment on Moreno's remarks. But President Donald Trump has been publicly critical of Colombia's government and has threatened to increase tariffs on the country for allegedly failing to stop its domestic drug production (see 2510200008).