I think you described the purpose accurately. It's designed to put particular pressure on particular individuals so that they'll stop doing things they've been doing, which in this case is the oppression of human rights specifically inside Russia. There is talk about expanding the Magnitsky Act to be a global issue and to then target human rights around the world.
From the limited perspective of imposing costs on particular individuals, it can have an impact, but I don't think it's going to change state policy. This is the key issue for me. The degree to which human rights violations in Russia come from the top, and they come from the Kremlin, we haven't seen a single indication that Magnitsky has changed that decision-making or changed the direction of Russian policy on human rights and justice in the country.
I think, frankly, that would be the same situation if we applied the Magnitsky Act globally. We'd see certain individuals not be able to come to the United States because they wouldn't be able to engage in banking. However, by and large, unless we've decided that we're going to make it a fundamental issue of geostrategic importance for the United States vis-à-vis Russia, as in directly threaten Russian corporate entities' ability to operate in the United States, invest and trade there, I don't think it's going to have the kind of punch necessary to change the top-level human rights policies.
From my perspective, that means it's still in the class of "feel good". It feels good to do it and it has some degree of moral impact, but in terms of application and real punishment, frankly, I haven't seen it yet.