NORTH DAKOTA (KXNET) — Eight U.S. Senators have rallied together to propose a bill banning oil and natural gas imports from Venezuela and Iran, two of the supporting Senators include our very own, Senators John Hoeven and Kevin Cramer.

After the horrific events of last weekend in the Middle East, U.S. Senators are standing up, in an attempt to hold Iran accountable for their sponsorship of Hamas and other terrorist organizations.

It’s an attempt to stop foreign adversaries profiting from us. This also includes Venezuela.

“You’ve got two really bad adversaries of the United States that are oil-producing countries. Iran, which is obviously in the crosshairs right now because of course, they’re the main sponsor of Hamas and Hezbollah who are attacking Israel. And then you have Venezuela, which the Maduro dictatorship is still intact there,” said Sen. Cramer.

In conjunction, they are working to reintroduce the Preempting Misguided Appeasement and Financing of Destabilizing Regimes Act to prohibit imports of Venezuelan and Iranian and natural gas into the United States.

“They’re a strong ally of China’s and of Russia’s. They produce heavy, sour, crude oil, and they have the filthiest environmental standards of just about any oil-producing country in the world, maybe of any in the world. We’re at the very least not gonna allow the importation of oil from the bad actors, including Venezuela and Iran,” said Sen. Cramer.

Since North Dakota is a leader in oil and gas production, this could impact our state directly.

“The administration needs to take the handcuffs off our energy producers. We can produce more oil in North Dakota and in other states, and we do it with the best environmental standards. It is about energy security being national security. We need to produce it at all, not get it from dictators like Maduro, “said Sen. Hoeven.

The efforts of the bill are to push America’s energy force. And they want to bring energy production back home to the U.S.

“What it really does is it helps make the country and the world safer and cleaner. The Biden Administration states it has long promised sanctions relief in return for democratic concessions from these nations,” said Sen. Cramer.

Specifically in Venezuela, the administration reached a 2024 election deal between the Venezuelan government and the country’s current political opposition.

At the moment, Senator Hoeven says there are no democratic co-signers on the proposed bill.

The legislation comes in response to recent reports indicating the Biden Administration had agreed to lift sanctions on the Maduro regime’s petroleum industry in Venezuela.