The US Senate Foreign Relations Committee has approved a bipartisan bill that would officially designate Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism if it fails to return thousands of Ukrainian children abducted from occupied territories, Senator Lindsey Graham announced on October 22.
The Designating the Russian Federation as a State Sponsor of Terrorism Act (S. 2978), introduced by Graham alongside Senators Richard Blumenthal, Katie Britt, and Amy Klobuchar, aims to “exert maximum pressure on Russia” to ensure peace in Ukraine and secure the safe return of more than 19,000 Ukrainian children forcibly taken by Russian forces.
“I am very pleased that the Senate Foreign Relations Committee unanimously reported out my bill… to designate Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism under US law if they do not return the almost 20,000 Ukrainian children they kidnapped from occupied areas,” Graham said in a statement.
“These kidnappings by Putin’s Russia represent one of the most outrageous events since World War II.”
If the bill passes Congress, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio will be required to submit a report to lawmakers within 60 days confirming whether the children have been safely repatriated.
Should Russia fail to do so, the Secretary would be legally obliged to place Russia on the list of state sponsors of terrorism—a designation currently applied to Iran, North Korea, Cuba, Sudan, and Libya.
Graham emphasized that the move would have far-reaching economic and diplomatic consequences for Moscow.
“Making Russia a state sponsor of terrorism would be devastating to Russia’s economy,” he said. “It is a necessary consequence of Putin’s behavior if these kidnapped children are not returned home.”
The legislation also requires Russia to cease attacks on civilian infrastructure and stop assassination attempts against political targets to have the designation lifted, according to amendments supported by committee leaders.
Graham described the bill as a critical step toward accountability, adding that the world must not allow the Kremlin to “kidnap children, bomb cities, and murder civilians without consequences.”
Earlier, Russia’s Commissioner for Children’s Rights, Maria Lvova-Belova, recently gave an interview where she described taking a 15-year-old orphan, Pylyp, from the occupied Ukrainian city of Mariupol to Russia. Pylyp, who had lost his mother at 10, had expressed a strong dislike for Russia and did not want to live there.
Even_Routine1981 on October 24th, 2025 at 00:59 UTC »
Took 3 years of ass scratching to even consider this? Dam shame the entire western world didn't go ballistic over this on day one. Cowards
Empty_Sea9 on October 24th, 2025 at 00:12 UTC »
Genuinely shocking considering I assumed most of them were in Russia’s pocket. Wonder what changed.
PinheadLarry2323 on October 23rd, 2025 at 23:46 UTC »
Reports state Russia currently holds over 19,500 Ukrainian children against their will, and are subjecting them to “forced militarization” at 210 facilities. If this legislation is enacted and the designation occurs, Russia would join only 4 other countries currently on the US State Sponsored Terrorism list (Iran, North Korea, Syria, and Cuba).
The impacts on Russia would span diplomatic, legal, and economic sectors, and the designation would trigger miscellaneous financial restrictions and implicate secondary sanctions laws, penalizing foreign entities (companies, banks, or governments) for doing business with Russia in violation of US rules. This could target major trading partners like China, which supplies dual-use goods and buys Russian resources to sustain its war economy, potentially leading to penalties on Chinese firms.
Russia could face barriers to international debt relief, loans from bodies like the World Bank (where the US would oppose them), and further isolation from global financial systems. Lawsuits enabled by lost sovereign immunity might result in asset seizures, adding to financial pressure.