US Senators Marco Rubio and Alex Padilla introduced the Mahsa Amini Human Rights and Security Accountability (MAHSA) Act to the Senate to hold accountable the Iranian leadership and tighten the noose of sanctions over human rights abuses and the crackdown against protestors in Iran.
This bill would require a report to Congress in 90 days regarding each foreign person described as responsible for human rights violations in Iran, the Supreme Leader, the President of Iran, and entities overseen by their offices.
The report should be published on the website of the US federal government.
The bill would impose applicable sanctions on those identified individuals and institutions.
“The Iranian regime has actively wreaked havoc against its own people and countless other nations. The US must evaluate and re-amp economic pressure against Senior Iranian regime officials who are actively partaking in the crackdown of Iranian protestors and civilians,” said Senator Rubio.
“Iranian protesters have demonstrated tremendous courage in voicing their outrage toward the Iranian regime after the brutal murder of Mahsa Amini. We must do our part to hold Iranian leaders accountable for their violent crackdown of these protests and the regime’s ongoing repression, censorship, and abuse against its people,” said Senator Padilla.
The MAHSA Act – which has 68 Republican and 60 Democrat cosponsors – and is supported by the National Union for Democracy in Iran (NUFDI), United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI), and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), was first introduced by Representatives Jim Banks (R-IN) and Eric Swalwell (D-CA) during the 117th Congress in January, about four months of protests following the death of 22-year-old Iranian-Kurdish woman Mahsa Amini at the hands of Iran's hijab police.
“The Supreme Leader is an institution of the Islamic Republic of Iran...that holds ultimate authority over Iran’s judiciary and security apparatus, including the Ministry of Intelligence and Security, law enforcement forces under the Interior Ministry, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), and the Basij, a nationwide volunteer paramilitary group, subordinate to the IRGC, all of which have engaged in human rights abuses in Iran,” read a paragraph of the MAHSA Act.
Some lobbyists and a few lawmakers have been seeking to dilute the act, describing it as “not leading to any increased sanctions” because Khamenei and Raisi were already sanctioned by the US.
