{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.cruz.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/sen-cruz-sends-letter-to-secretary-blinken-calling-for-imposition-of-mandatory-sanctions-on-the-vice-president-of-argentina", "Sen. Cruz Sends Letter to Secretary Blinken Calling for Imposition of Mandatory Sanctions on the Vice President of Argentina", "2022-08-25", "2022", "2022-08", "Republican", "Senate", "TX", "Ted Cruz", "C001098", "www.cruz.senate.gov", "cruz", "https://www.cruz.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases", "scraper", "WASHINGTON, D.C. \u2013 U.S. Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas), member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, today sent a letter to Secretary of State Anthony Blinken calling for the State Department to expeditiously impose sanctions mandated by Congress on Argentine Vice President Cristina Fern\u00e1ndez de Kirchner and her immediate family members.\n\nIn the letter, Sen. Cruz highlighted corruption charges recently brought by an Argentine Federal Prosecutor said that corrupt acts by Kircher had \u201cfor decades undermined the rule of law in Argentina, convulsed its political institutions, and undermined American interests\u201d and in particular highlighted that \u201cshe is deeply implicated in the 2015 death of Argentine Special Prosecutor Alberto Nisman\u201d:\n\n\u201cI write to bring your attention to increasingly brazen and now-public corrupt acts by Argentina\u2019s former President and current Vice President Cristina Fern\u00e1ndez de Kirchner, which have for decades undermined the rule of law in Argentina, convulsed its political institutions, and undermined American interests in the country and indeed the region. Perhaps most notoriously, but certainly not exclusively, she is deeply implicated in the 2015 death of Argentine Special Prosecutor Alberto Nisman, who was found shot in his apartment the day before he was set to present evidence to the Argentine Congress that would have proved Fern\u00e1ndez de Kirchner colluded with Iran to cover up Iran\u2019s role in the 1994 bombing of the Asociaci\u00f3n Mutual Israelita Argentina (AMIA) in Buenos Aires, the worst terrorist attack in Argentina's history.\n\n\u201cLast week, an Argentine Federal Prosecutor formally implicated Fern\u00e1ndez de Kirchner in what he described as \u201cthe biggest corruption scheme ever known in the country,\u201d\n\n\u201cThe evidence supporting the charges against Fern\u00e1ndez de Kirchner is public, credible, and now backed by Argentina\u2019s judicial system. Simply what has been verified if only by default \u2013 what her defenders have all but conceded \u2013 is already as or more significant than the evidence that the State Department recently presented as part of its justification for designating Velazquez. Meanwhile the consequences and threats of Fern\u00e1ndez de Kirchner\u2019s corruption stretch globally.\n\n\u201cI therefore urge you to process past and recent information about Fern\u00e1ndez de Kirchner\u2019s corrupt acts, and to impose a Section 7031(c) designation on her and immediate family members. As always, I stand ready to provide you and the Department with the resources you need to expeditiously conduct these important tasks.\u201d\n\nThe full text of the letter can be found here.\n\n###", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-08T02:59:24Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.cruz.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/sen-cruz-sends-letter-to-secretary-blinken-calling-for-imposition-of-mandatory-sanctions-on-the-vice-president-of-argentina"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.5342619735747576, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}