{"id":536330,"date":"2026-03-21T08:02:12","date_gmt":"2026-03-21T08:02:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/536330\/"},"modified":"2026-03-21T08:02:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-21T08:02:12","slug":"why-the-trump-administration-is-easing-sanctions-on-certain-iranian-oil-stockpiles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/536330\/","title":{"rendered":"Why the Trump administration is easing sanctions on certain Iranian oil stockpiles"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n Trump administration officials are making a desperate push to secure every available barrel of oil amid a worsening energy crisis \u2014 even if it means lifting sanctions on the very country<\/a> that they\u2019re fighting against.\n <\/p>\n

\n But three weeks into war with Iran, the administration is running out of options to contain the skyrocketing price of oil<\/a> and gas.\n <\/p>\n

\n Trump officials now privately estimate that the higher prices triggered by the war could linger for months, especially as fighting in the Middle East intensifies and passage through the Strait of Hormuz remains nearly impossible, three people familiar with the internal discussions said.\n <\/p>\n

\n The US has already exhausted all of its go-to policy levers for alleviating the supply shock rippling through the global economy, those people said. The remaining options available to the government range from largely ineffective to deeply unpalatable.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cThis is the biggest disruption to the oil markets that you can imagine,\u201d said Neelesh Nerurkar, a former senior Trump Energy Department official. \u201cThe shortfall is so large that the measures available are dwarfed by how much oil is not reaching the market.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n The Trump administration has already agreed to release hundreds of millions of barrels from its strategic reserves<\/a>, eased some sanctions on Russian oil<\/a> and taken steps domestically to accelerate crude flows throughout the US.\n <\/p>\n

\n Yet those actions have done little to slow the surge in prices around the world. Brent crude, the global oil benchmark, hit $112 a barrel on Friday \u2014 hovering near highs not seen in three-and-a-half years. US gas prices have risen sharply as well, with the national average approaching $4 per gallon.\n <\/p>\n

\n Officials are now going even further by temporarily removing sanctions on barrels of Iranian oil that are currently at sea, a move that will allow allies badly in need of supply to purchase them.\n <\/p>\n

\"Gas<\/p>\n

\n The optics of such a move are discomfiting: As the US tries to decimate the Iranian regime militarily, it will simultaneously be allowing the regime to benefit financially. It\u2019s a tacit acknowledgement of the intense economic and political pressure that Iran has put on the US by closing the Strait of Hormuz.\n <\/p>\n

\n And for President Donald Trump, the dynamics are particularly awkward. After repeatedly criticizing former President Barack Obama for sending cash to Iran as part of his nuclear deal with the country, Trump is now effectively encouraging Iran to step up its oil sales.\n <\/p>\n

\n But inside an administration trying to manage the widening fallout of the war, the upside of injecting roughly 140 million more barrels into an increasingly parched market was seen as worth it.\n <\/p>\n

\n Trump officials warmed to the idea in recent days, downplaying the financial significance for Iran of allowing countries to purchase supply that it already has at sea.\n <\/p>\n

\n That oil would have eventually been purchased by China in spite of US sanctions, they\u2019ve argued. Instead, US allies could buy it, easing their immediate supply concerns at only a slightly higher price than China would have paid Iran otherwise.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cIran was going to sell those barrels anyway,\u201d said one of the people familiar with the internal discussions. \u201cInstead of going to China, we make it sellable to Thailand or Vietnam.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Friday framed the move as \u201cusing the Iranian barrels against Tehran to keep the price down as we continue Operation Epic Fury.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cIran will have difficulty accessing any revenue generated and the United States will continue to maintain maximum pressure on Iran and its ability to access the international financial system,\u201d he wrote on X<\/a>.\n <\/p>\n

\n US Ambassador to the United Nations Mike Waltz said Friday the move to ease sanctions is \u201cvery temporary\u201d to \u201cdefeat the Iranian strategy of driving energy prices so high.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cSo we\u2019re going to allow it to go in a temporary basis to some of our allies like India, Japan and others so that this strategy from Iran, the Iranian regime, doesn\u2019t work,\u201d Waltz told Dana Bash at a CNN town hall<\/a> on Iran.\n <\/p>\n

\n Still, Iran is expected to reap some amount of profit from selling the barrels in a market where prices have climbed by more than one-third since the war began. And while the additional supply might offer some reprieve, the impact is likely to be short-lived. The 140 million barrels available at sea is equal to about one-and-a-half days of global oil consumption, according to the US Energy Information Administration.\n <\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

\n \u201cIf they pursue this strategy and allow buyers to buy off this oil on the water, it\u2019ll go quickly,\u201d said Gregory Brew, a senior analyst at Eurasia Group who specializes in oil and gas. \u201cThen we\u2019ll be faced with the interesting proposal of dropping sanctions on Iranian oil generally.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n In a statement, White House spokeswoman Taylor Rogers said that Trump and his team \u201chave considered all the options on the table to mitigate these short-term disruptions and has quickly taken action when necessary.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cUltimately, once the military objectives are completed, oil and gas prices will drop rapidly again, potentially even lower than before the strikes began,\u201d she said.\n <\/p>\n

\n The move to lift even some sanctions on Iran underscores the bind that the administration finds itself in, trying to balance its longer-term war aims against the more immediate repercussions for the economy and Trump\u2019s political standing.\n <\/p>\n

\n Trump has largely brushed off the impact on oil and gas prices, arguing that the war is worth any \u201cshort-term pain\u201d<\/a> it causes Americans. On Friday, he dismissed questions about the White House\u2019s plan for restoring traffic through the Strait of Hormuz<\/a>, saying that \u201cat a certain point, it\u2019ll open itself.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n That\u2019s left foreign allies and oil companies in the dark and girding for a prolonged disruption. Even within the administration, planning for the next stages of the fight has been closely held among Trump\u2019s top advisers, making it difficult for officials charged with mitigating the energy crisis to anticipate what might come next.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cThey\u2019re kind of resigned to watching,\u201d said one of the people familiar with the internal discussions. \u201cThe way this administration has run its policy is a very small group \u2014 and that only expands to solve problems.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n The administration could soon waive environmental regulations on certain summer blends of gasoline, in hopes of putting a dent in US gas prices, the people familiar with the discussions said.\n <\/p>\n

\n But the effect would likely be limited, especially since the government has taken that step every summer since 2022. A White House official said no decision has been made yet on waiving the summer-blend gasoline regulations, and insisted that there are \u201cstill many options on the table\u201d that the administration is considering taking to address oil and gas prices.\n <\/p>\n

\"President<\/p>\n

\n In the meantime, officials have ruled out a handful of other, more extreme options. Trump aides have assured anxious oil companies that there are no plans to impose restrictions on oil and gas exports, amid fears that it would throw the global markets into chaos and do little to expand the availability of supply within the US.\n <\/p>\n

\n Bessent on Thursday also ruled out having the government directly intervene in oil markets to try to slow the rise in prices.\n <\/p>\n

\n While he also suggested at the time that the US could release even more oil from its strategic reserve, there are no plans to take that step any time soon either, an administration official said. The US and dozens of other countries already agreed earlier this month to put 400 million barrels of reserve oil on the market, a process that will take months to play out.\n <\/p>\n

\n Against that backdrop, the stark reality is that the administration is fast approaching a binary choice, energy experts said: Find a way to reopen the Strait of Hormuz or brace for a growing cascade of painful economic consequences.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cThe nuance here is there isn\u2019t nuance,\u201d said Landon Derentz, a former national security and energy official during the Obama, Trump and Biden administrations. \u201cNobody else has a bright idea.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n This story has been updated with additional details.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Trump administration officials are making a desperate push to secure every available barrel of oil amid a worsening…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":536331,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-536330","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/536330","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=536330"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/536330\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/536331"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=536330"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=536330"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=536330"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}