PoliticsAP
President Barack Obama will deliver a statement on the crisis in Ukraine at 10:45 a.m. ET, the White House said.
His remarks are scheduled to come hours after he signed an executive order authorizing sanctions on seven high-level Russian individuals involved in the situation, all of whom the White House called "cronies" of the regime of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The sanctions were a response to the Russian government's role in the crisis, which escalated Sunday when Crimea voted overwhelmingly in a contoversial referendum to split from Ukraine and join the Russian Federation. Though local officials said more than 95 percent of Crimea voters chose to join Russia, the U.S. and European Union have long made clear they didn't view the referendum as legal or legitimate.
The new executive order lists seven individuals designated for sanctions - Vladislav Surkov, Sergey Glazyev, Leonid Slutsky, Andrei Klishas, Valentina Matviyenko, Dmitry Rogozin, and Yelena Mizulina.