Senator Shaheen urges Congress to increase pressure on Putin after hearing on abducted Ukrainian children

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Thursday announced that Senator Jeanne Shaheen, the Committee’s Ranking Member, urged Congress to advance legislation aimed at increasing pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Her statement followed a hearing of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs titled “The Abduction of Ukrainian Children by the Russian Federation”, which Shaheen attended earlier in the day.

Shaheen criticised the Trump Administration’s ongoing negotiations with Moscow, noting that Special Envoy Steve Witkoff’s sixth visit to Russia had again yielded no tangible progress.

“Despite the sixth visit by [...] Witkoff to Moscow to negotiate with Putin, he has once again left empty handed. We have seen the Trump Administration literally roll out the red carpet for Putin in Alaska and endorse an initial ‘capitulation proposal’ for Ukraine. The Administration has done everything possible to appeal to Putin but failed to use every tool at its disposal to put real pressure on Putin to negotiate”, she said.

Shaheen highlighted the gravity of negotiating with a leader responsible for systematic abuses.

“This hearing reminded us that the Trump Administration is negotiating with a brutal, ruthless dictator who is not just intent on stealing Ukraine’s land but is also trafficking its children. Putin is trying to wipe Ukraine, its culture and its history off the map,” Shaheen stated.

“The Trump Administration needs to be clear-eyed that negotiations with Putin are so much more complicated than a transactional business deal. A peace deal needs to guarantee that no one in Ukraine or Europe will be subjected to Putin’s brutality ever again”, she addd.

Shaheen called on the Senate to swiftly pass legislation authored by Senator Lindsey Graham, the Designating the Russian Federation as a State Sponsor of Terrorism Act. She noted the bill had already cleared the Foreign Relations Committee in October, alongside two other Russia-related measures, including her bipartisan proposal to sanction China for supporting Russia’s war effort in Ukraine.