Joe Biden Announces New Sanctions On Russia In Response To Vladimir Putin’s Start Of An “Invasion Of Ukraine”

President Joe Biden, addressing the dire crisis in Ukraine, today said that he is imposing a series of new sanctions on Russia, the latest move in a geopolitical crisis over the widespread belief that Vladimir Putin is poised to launch a widespread move into the Eastern European country.

“This is the beginning of a Russian invasion of Ukraine,” Biden bluntly said, promising that “if Russia goes further with this invasion, we stand prepared to go further as with sanctions.” The speech by President Biden comes Tuesday as Russian President Putin officially called the 2014 Minsk Agreement dead and pulled his own diplomats out of Ukraine. (UPDATE, 2:19 PM PT: U.S Secretary of State Tony Blinken said in a press conference with the Ukrainian Foreign Minister that he has cancelled a planned February 24 meeting in Geneva with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov because of Russia’s moves into Ukraine)

“Who in the Lord’s name does Putin think gives him the right to declare new so-called countries on territory that belonged to his neighbors?” Biden added in his remarks of the ex-KGB agent, who clearly dreams of reuniting the former USSR geographically and geopolitically. “This is a flagrant violation of international law, and it demands a firm response from the international community,” Biden declared as the NATO alliance moved both economically and in terms of getting hardware to support Ukraine.

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These new sanctions come a day after Putin announced the recognition of two separatist regions of Ukraine as independent republics, a move widely viewed as a prelude to an attack. Indeed, Putin approved the movement of troops into the eastern regions as a “peacekeeping” force, further escalating what may be a wider invasion.

Coming after a face-to-face meeting with the Ukrainian Foreign Minister in the White House, Biden’s brief speech from the East Room was delayed about an hour and 20 minutes from its originally scheduled start, perhaps underscoring the delicate task that the president faces in navigating the escalating crisis. Cable networks carried the speech live. Among broadcasters, ABC, NBC and Fox had special reports from the White House. CBS stayed with the UEFA Champions League pre match, at least on the West Coast.

The first “tranche” of sanctions, Biden said, would be on two Russian financial institutions, as well as Russian sovereign debt, which means that the country can no longer raise money from the West and cannot trade debt on U.S. and European markets. He also said that sanctions would be imposed on Russian elites and their family members.

“Yesterday, the world heard clearly the full extent of Vladimir Putin’s twisted rewrite of history,” Biden said, referring to Putin’s lengthy speech on Russian TV on Monday. Biden said that there was still time for diplomacy to avoid a “worst case scenario.” In his sometimes rambling address, Putin also declared that the 2014 Minsk Agreement does “not exist” and pulled his diplomats out of Ukraine. The Russian leader also received approval from Russia’s parliament to use military force outside of the country.

Other countries also have taken steps in response. Earlier on Tuesday, Germany halted certification of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline that was to bring natural gas from Russia to  western Europe. The UK implemented its own first round of sanctions against Russia and its leadership. Before Biden’s speech, Japan announced they will hit Russia with sanctions like its fellow G7 members.

In the wake of Putin’s speech, the White House on Monday had stopped short of calling Russia’s movements an “invasion.” But that changed on Tuesday morning, when deputy national security adviser Jon Finer, on CNN, called it “the beginning of an invasion.”

Stocks stemmed losses as markets digested Biden’s address. Indexes had turned pretty dour ahead of the speech and while it’s not a bed of roses — the DJIA is down 387 points, or 1.1% — they are all off lows for the day.

While, U.S. financial markets were closed Monday for Presidents Day when Putin deployed troops into two breakaway pro-Moscow regions in eastern Ukraine, the economic impact of America and its allies’ sanctions had a near immediate effect today.

The Nasdaq is currently off by 1.1%. The S&P 500 and Russell 2000 by 0.9% and 1.2%, respectively. Russia-Ukraine tensions have weighed on stocks in recent weeks and this isn’t likely to be the last word. Today saw in a noteworthy spike in oil prices at a time of already high U.S. inflation and the market will remain jittery that retaliatory sanctions on Putin’s regime could have widespread ripple effects on the global economy.

This afternoon, Biden sternly slapped sanctions on big state-owned Russian investment bank VEB, froze trading of Russia sovereign debt, blocked the country’s ability to raise funds in the west and targeted the finances of Russian elites and their family members in an attempt to pressure the leader. He didn’t say how many, or how broad the list of oligarchs is. He also didn’t yet sanction Russia’s commercial banks, which would have the biggest impact on the overall economy. He’s saving that to tighten the squeeze in case of further moves by Putin.

Biden said he was going to do the best he could to make sure the pain hit the “Russian economy, not ours,” mainly by trying to ensure stable energy prices. Gasoline prices are matter of political expediency for the President. “I want to blunt the pain the American people are feeling at the gas pump. This is critical to me,” he said.

The red ink encompassed most of media. Two exceptions are shares of Tegna, the big broadcaster that agreed to be acquired this morning, up 6%, and Roku, up 10%, in a rebound after disappointment earnings smacked the stock late last week.

In the wait for the Biden speech to start, CNN went multiple times to correspondents in Ukraine and Moscow, as well as the White House. John Harwood assessed the impact of U.S. sanctions. “This is going to be a long slog, the results of which are going to sting the pocketbook of the American people,” he said.

Biden said that his administration “is using every tool at our disposal to protect American businesses and consumers from rising prices at the pump. As I said last week, defending freedom will have costs for us as well, here at home. We need to be honest about that. But as we do this, I am going to take robust action to make sure the pain of our sanctions is targeted at the Russian economy, not ours.”

— Jill Goldsmith contributed to this report.