Crapo, Rubio, Shaheen Hizballah Sanctions Bill Heads to President's Desk

Washington, D.C. – The U.S. Senate passed the Hizballah International Financing Prevention Amendments Act, authored bySenate Banking Committee Chairman Mike Crapo (R-ID) and Ranking Member Sherrod Brown (D-OH), U.S. Senators Marco Rubio (R-FL), Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), , and House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce (R-CA) and Ranking Member Eliot Engel (D-NY). The bill now heads to the President to be signed into law. 

The bill strengthens and expands the scope of economic and financial sanctions imposed by the original Hizballah International Financing Prevention Act (Public Law 104-102), which Rubio and Shaheen co-authored with Royce and Engel in 2015. 

“Hizballah, its agents and Iranian financial backers are experts in the art of concealing their nefarious dealings,” said Crapo. “This legislation, spearheaded by Senators Rubio, Shaheen and our House colleagues, builds on the legislation passed in 2015, imposes additional sanctions on Hizballah, and targets those foreign nations, government agencies and foreign companies or individuals who would support its terrorist activities by knowingly providing arms, recruitment services and combat or financial support to its terrorist activities.  It is long overdue, and constant vigilance must be maintained if we are ever to see an end to the evil this terrorist group brings.” 

“Iranian-backed Hizballah terrorists are responsible for the deaths of hundreds of Americans, and continue to pose grave threats to the United States and our allies, including the democratic state of Israel,” Rubio said. “This legislation will strengthen international efforts to combat the financing and expansion of Hizballah’s terrorist and missile threats, as well as its narcotics trafficking and other transnational criminal activities, and build upon the successes of our 2015 law that targets Hizballah, its proxies and its enablers. I thank my colleagues in the Senate and House for their support of this important bill, and I look forward to seeing the president sign it into law soon.” 

“Hizballah has American blood on its hands and remains an ever-present threat to our national security and that of our allies, especially Israel," said Shaheen. "This bipartisan legislation helps further close the space in which Hizballah operates and ensures that our government is comprehensively targeting Hizballah’s networks of support and holding its backers accountable. I look forward to the President signing this legislation into law so that these enhanced measures can go into effect as soon as possible.” 

“I’m pleased the Senate has approved and the President is expected to sign bipartisan legislation to provide the administration with important new tools to combat the terrorist group Hezbollah,” said Brown. “Congress must continue to press efforts to disrupt Hezbollah’s financing while strongly supporting our allies, including Israel, through closer security cooperation. This bill makes clear we must confront this threat by deploying a broad range of tools -- sanctions, law enforcement, financial, regulatory and others -- to combat Hezbollah, its affiliates  and supporters throughout the region.” 

###