US Senate approves repeal of punishing Assad-era Syria Caesar sanctions

The US Senate on Thursday approved its version of the Department of Defense budget for 2026, which includes a repeal of the 2019 Caesar Act, which put sanctions on entities and officials tied to Syria's deposed regime.

The long-awaited vote on the $913.9 billion version of the 2026 fiscal defence bill saw 77 senators vote in favour, with 22 against, with the legislation stuck on the Senate floor for over a month due to numerous amendments being added.

The sanctions were put in place due to gross human rights abuses committed by the former regime, including the mass torture and slaughter of opposition detainees, but after the fall of Bashar Al-Assad, sanctions on state entities remained in place, which Syrians said was a form of unfair collective punishment on a country trying to rebuild from 13 years of war.

"Grateful the Senate has passed a REPEAL of the Caesar Act as part of the NDAA!" wrote Republican congressman J0e Wilson on X. "These very severe sanctions were imposed on a regime which, thankfully, no longer exists. Syria’s success now depends on FULL & TOTAL repeal."

Syrian-American Council member Mohammed Alaa Ghanem praised the move, describing it as a "dramatic victory in every sense of the word".

"Another provision was passed, which includes a set of benchmarks for the Syrian government to meet. However, we managed to amend the language so that these are no longer binding conditions that would automatically reinstate Caesar sanctions if they unmet, and they are now non-binding objectives," Ghanem said.

Congress will only be required to hold discussions if the objectives are not met within 12 months, he said, rather than the sanctions coming back into immediate effect.

Syrian Finance Minister Mohammed Yisr Barnieh welcomed the move and said that the Congress lower house should back the legislation.

"A joyful announcement - the U.S. Senate has approved a provision in the Department of Defense budget to repeal the Caesar Act," Barnieh wrote on Facebook. "The next step is for the House of Representatives to adopt the same provision in its version of the defense budget, leading to the President’s signature before the end of the year, after which the repeal of Caesar would come into effect."

The minister also highlighted the provision's inclusion of a clause calling for the Syrian embassy in Washington to be reopened.

Posting on X, Minister of Information Hamza Al-Mustafa described the vote as "a new success for active Syrian diplomacy and for the efforts of many sincere Syrians from the diaspora in the US, who spared no effort in this endeavour".

With the Senate having approved its version of the National Defense Authorization Act, negotiations will now take place with the House of Representatives to hammer out a final version of the budget with a final sign-off from the president, before the year's end.

The Caesar Act, named after a Syrian defector who exposed the horrific torture and killing of detainees in the Assad regime’s prisons, imposed sanctions on deposed President Bashar al-Assad and many figures from his inner circle, but also on key Syrian industries.

The government of Syria's interim President Ahmed Al-Sharaa, who led the rebel offensive which overthrew Assad in December 2024, has been lobbying for their removal ever since it came to power.