Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, joined Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), the top Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee, and Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.) on Thursday in a bipartisan, bicameral letter asking U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio to drop Syria from the federal government’s list of state terror sponsors.
The lawmakers said that the reason for keeping Syria on the list no longer applies since Bashar Assad was overthrown as president in 2024.
In the letter to Rubio, the trio said that the action would help Syria’s economic recovery, counterterrorism cooperation and long-term stability. The designation “represents the most significant remaining legal impediment to Syria’s reconstruction,” they wrote.
A State Department official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that U.S. President Donald Trump instructed Rubio on June 30, 2025, to review the designation.
“This review is ongoing and in compliance with the applicable laws and criteria established by Congress,” the official said. “We don’t have a specific timeline to share at the moment. There are a number of steps that would need to be taken by both the department and the president before the SST designation could be removed.”
The official added that “as a general matter, we don’t comment on congressional correspondence.”
The lawmakers noted that the State Department told Congress last month that it had removed Syria from the list of countries not cooperating with U.S. counterterrorism efforts.
“Since the fall of the Assad regime, President Ahmed Al-Sharaa and the new Syrian government have demonstrated continued commitment to counterterrorism operations within Syria,” the lawmakers wrote. “The grounds for the SST designation in U.S. law no longer apply, and the listing remains a significant barrier to achieving the administration and congressional priority of giving Syria a chance to succeed.”
The lawmakers also wrote that removing Syria from the terrorism list would open the country to Western investment and wean the country from its dependence on China, Russia and Iran.
“They are pragmatic foreign policy operators, who will exploit any U.S. failure to make the best of our opportunities,” the lawmakers said of China, Russia and Iran.
“Russia continues to keep Syria reliant on Russian crude oil and wheat supplies while maintaining military bases from which it can project power in the region,” they wrote. “In addition, China is gaining an enormous advantage by embedding itself in critical Syrian sectors like telecommunications and technology despite Syria’s preference for U.S. and European companies.”
