(The Epoch Times)—The Trump administration announced on March 20 that it has sanctioned entities it says are tied to the petroleum trade between Iran and China.
The Department of State sanctioned an oil facility in China, Huaying Huizhou Daya Bay Petrochemical Terminal Storage, which has allegedly bought and sold Iranian crude oil from a vessel under U.S. sanctions.
“These sanctions are being imposed pursuant to President [Donald] Trump’s maximum pressure campaign to drive Iran’s oil exports, including to China, to zero,” State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said in a statement.
“China is by far the largest importer of Iranian oil. The Iranian regime uses the revenue it generates from these sales to finance attacks on U.S. allies, support terrorism around the world, and pursue other destabilizing actions.”
Meanwhile, the Treasury Department sanctioned Shandong Shouguang Luqing Petrochemical Co.
The oil refinery in China has allegedly bought and refined “hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of Iranian crude oil” from vessels tied to the Houthis, a terrorist organization, and the Iranian Ministry of Defense of Armed Forces Logistics, which is sanctioned by the United States.
The company’s chief executive officer, Wang Xueqing, was also sanctioned.
This is the first time the United States has sanctioned what is called a “teapot refinery,” which mainly buys oil from Iran.
“Teapot refinery purchases of Iranian oil provide the primary economic lifeline for the Iranian regime, the world’s leading state sponsor of terror,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a statement.
“The United States is committed to cutting off the revenue streams that enable Tehran’s continued financing of terrorism and development of its nuclear program.”
The Treasury Department also imposed sanctions on 19 other entities tied to petroleum sales between Iran and China.
Companies under sanctions will have their assets in the United States frozen.
Independent Journalism Is Dying
Ever since President Trump’s miraculous victory, we’ve heard an incessant drumbeat about how legacy media is dying. This is true. The people have awakened to the reality that they’re being lied to by the self-proclaimed “Arbiters of Truth” for the sake of political expediency, corporate self-protection, and globalist ambitions.
But even as independent journalism rises to fill the void left by legacy media, there is still a huge challenge. Those at the top of independent media like Joe Rogan, Dan Bongino, and Tucker Carlson are thriving and rightly so. They have earned their audience and the financial rewards that come from it. They’ve taken risks and worked hard to get to where they are.
For “the rest of us,” legacy media and their proxies are making it exceptionally difficult to survive, let alone thrive. They still have a stranglehold over the “fact checkers” who have a dramatic impact on readership and viewership. YouTube, Facebook, and Google still stifle us. The freer speech platforms like Rumble and 𝕏 can only reward so many of their popular content creators. For independent journalists on the outside looking in, our only recourse is to rely on affiliates and sponsors.
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Independent media is the future. In many ways, that future is already here. While the phrase, “the more the merrier,” does not apply to this business because there are still some bad actors in the independent media field, there are many great ones that do not get nearly enough attention. We hope to change that one content creator at a time.
Thank you and God Bless,
JD Rucker
