Senate Passes the Graham Sanctions Act 86 to 11 — the Move to Strip Its Tariff Authority Failed 32 to 64
Washington, 7 August 2026
Key points
- The Senate passed the Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026 on Friday 7 August, 86 votes to 11, sixteen months after the original Sanctioning Russia Act was introduced
- The Paul-Wyden amendment to strip the tariff authority failed 32 to 64 — the only direct challenge to the instrument at the centre of the bill
- Two rates, drawn under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act: up to 100 per cent on imports from the top five purchasers of Russian energy, the top five purchasers of Russian military equipment, and countries facilitating sanctions evasion; up to 500 per cent on Russian goods entering the United States directly
- The third-country ceiling was cut from 500 to 100 per cent to gather votes, and an exemption applies to countries importing less than 15 per cent of their natural gas from Russia while taking significant steps to reduce it
- It is not law: the House takes it up no earlier than early September, after a five-week recess. Representatives Gregory Meeks and Don Beyer call the current text unacceptable over the breadth of the authorities it hands the president
The United States Senate passed the Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026 on 7 August by 86 votes to 11, sending to the House a bill whose central instrument is a presidential tariff authority that survived its one direct challenge on the floor.
The bill carries the name of the senator who spent sixteen months trying to move it. Lindsey Graham died on 11 July, days after announcing that he and Donald Trump had agreed a path forward; it was reintroduced under his name on 16 July by his sister Darline Graham, appointed to his South Carolina seat, who read out the tally. Rand Paul of Kentucky was the only Republican to vote against, and the amendment he brought with Democrat Ron Wyden to remove the tariff powers altogether was defeated 32 to 64 before passage.
The architecture matters more than the headline rate. Two instruments sit in the text: conventional sanctions on Russian officials, entities and the shadow-fleet network, and a tariff power drawn under emergency economic authorities. That power reaches three categories — the top five purchasers of Russian energy, the top five purchasers of Russian military equipment, and countries facilitating evasion of energy sanctions — at up to 100 per cent, a ceiling cut from the original 500 to gather votes; a separate 500 per cent rate applies to Russian goods entering the United States directly. Imposition and removal are both discretionary, and a written exemption shelters countries importing less than 15 per cent of their natural gas from Russia while taking significant steps to reduce it. China, India and Türkiye are the states most reporting places in scope; Reuters has also named Japan and some European Union member states.
European exposure runs through the evasion test, which carries no exemption. The purchaser limbs are the ones the 15 per cent gas threshold was written for, and most of the Union now sits below it; the facilitation limb has no equivalent shelter and describes conduct — shipping, insurance, port and registry services — that the EU has spent the past year listing against itself, from the 41 shadow-fleet vessels and frozen oil-price cap of the 21st package onward. An American tariff designation on that limb would put a member state on the wrong side of an instrument aimed at behaviour Brussels is already prosecuting, and it would be a designation nobody in Brussels votes on. Großwald recorded the passage in Signal No. 119. The narrower question the House answers is procedural: the Senate text unamended goes to the president, and any change restarts the clock.
Related · Russian energy sanctions and their enforcement
