Scott Bessent, the U.S. Treasury Secretary under President Donald Trump, in an interview with Fox Business on March 18.
Guacamaya, March 18, 2025. U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is facing a personal dilemma. He has repeatedly stated that sanctions are being overused, yet he defends that they need to be intensified to compel rival states to negotiate.
In an interview on Tuesday with Fox Business, U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent stated that “President Trump has instructed me to reconsider the sanctions regime.” He added, “For a long time, we had lazy sanctions; they were just there. We believe this threatened the dollar’s status as a reserve currency, as people moved away from the dollar.”
Earlier this month, speaking before the Economic Club of New York, the Treasury Secretary compared sanctions to “the overuse of antibiotics; the target becomes immune and mutates.” As he explained, both President Donald Trump and he himself share this concern.
However, when asked about economic sanctions against Iran and Russia on Fox Business, his response was that Biden had been too lenient in their use.
Bessent proposes measures of “maximum impact” that, in his view, would force governments to sit down at the negotiating table with the United States. “Now we are going for maximum impact; it’s a new sanctions regime. We go in, hit them fast, hit them hard, and that’s what we’re doing with Iran.”
He also acknowledges the harm that can be inflicted on civilians, within the goal of reducing oil exports “to zero” and thus forcing Tehran to negotiate. “The Iranian economy is in great difficulty; we feel sorry for the Iranian people, but their government has brought this upon them.”
Regarding Russia, he stated that Joe Biden’s former National Security Advisor, Jake Sullivan, had increased the intensity of sanctions “from a 3 to a 6, but if necessary, we will take them to a 10.”
So, from the perspective of Bessent and Trump, are sanctions a necessary evil? Do they undermine U.S. hegemony and the dollar, but there is no alternative?
