In early March, as the Iran conflict drove crude prices above $100 a barrel, executives from the Washington-based lobbying outfit Qorvis reportedly floated an unusual proposal to senior U.S. officials. The suggestion was that the Trump administration should ease certain sanctions on Iran and Russia to help steady the volatile market. Within days, the Treasury Department issued short-term waivers permitting the sale and offloading of Iranian and Russian crude that had been stranded aboard tankers at sea.

Critics condemned the decision, arguing it handed a temporary profit window to the secretive shipping operators who facilitate sanctions evasion — the so-called “shadow fleet” that bolsters Tehran and Moscow. Some Asian nations, however, welcomed the measure. It remains unclear how much sway Qorvis’s advice held over these exemptions. The waivers remained in place until early July amid a series of stalled peace talks, after which the U.S. again threatened fresh secondary sanctions.

Over the past year, Qorvis was engaged to provide services for Singapore-based Wellbred Capital Pte and Dubai-based 2Rivers Group — entities that Western officials say are controlled by two of the most influential figures in the sanctioned oil trade. Qorvis has not hidden its work for these firms. Yet its chair, Samantha Sault, denies any working relationship with the sanctioned oil magnates themselves, whom government agencies identify as the controllers of the entities Qorvis serves.

Qorvis posted some responses to press queries on its website. Sault addressed a number of these, but has not replied to follow-up questions. The firm maintains that Iranian oil tycoon Hossein Shamkhani and Azerbaijani businessman Etibar Eyyub are not its clients. Both men were named in sanctions imposed by Western authorities over the past two years, which cited illicit petroleum dealings. Neither responded to requests for comment.

“We do not accept sanctioned money,” Sault wrote in a post on the Qorvis website. Shamkhani has previously denied owning any oil companies and said he only conducts business in non-sanctioned countries. Eyyub has called his sanctions “baseless and unlawful.” In her published responses, Sault did not dispute that Qorvis approached senior U.S. officials about oil sanctions policy in March, but she stressed it was not done at the behest of Shamkhani or Eyyub. “Government officials frequently consult Qorvis on mechanisms for maintaining market stability,” she said.

Treasury Department officials did not respond to requests for comment. In interviews, more than a dozen people familiar with Qorvis’s operations — including current and former employees — described a deeper relationship between the firm and the two sanctioned oil magnates. According to several sources with direct knowledge, Qorvis provided a range of services to Shamkhani and Eyyub. Sault describes Qorvis as “a company primarily engaged in communications and strategic consulting.” Those services, sources say, included efforts to influence, anticipate, and react to White House policy, enforcement actions, and sensitive diplomatic negotiations.

The sources requested anonymity, citing potential legal risks or professional retaliation from disclosing confidential information. Their accounts shed light on how Shamkhani and Eyyub have sought to shape U.S. policy. Shamkhani’s father was a senior adviser to Iran’s late supreme leader, while Eyyub is a low-profile Azerbaijani who rose to the upper echelons of Moscow’s oil trading circles. The accounts also offer a rare glimpse inside the workings of a lobbying and communications firm. This article also draws on public filings and legal records, plus interviews with roughly 20 other individuals, including Qorvis clients, industry rivals, and U.S. officials, detailing the firm’s modus operandi over recent years.

The White House directed questions to the Justice Department, which did not respond to a request for comment. Wellbred also did not respond. In a July email, 2Rivers stated, “Mr. Etibar Eyyub is not affiliated with 2Rivers and has not been since early 2022.” Yet when the EU sanctioned Eyyub in December 2025, it said he “created and operated a network of companies including Coral Energy (later renamed 2Rivers Group)” that “controls and uses a significant portion of Russia’s so-called shadow fleet.”