Overview
The Lindsey O. Graham Russia Sanctions Act of 2026 is waiting in the House hopper once it returns from recess on September 1. The bill would authorize the White House, at its discretion, to impose secondary tariffs of up to 100% on the top five importers of Russian oil and gas, in addition to the top five countries facilitating sanctions evasion and any country that knowingly makes additional crude or natural gas purchases. The bill is slated to pass if President Trump continues to prioritize it, and if adopted, the White House may treat the secondary tariff authority as negotiating leverage against China and India, or possibly the EU bloc, to extract political concessions. In terms of upside risks, the Russia sanctions bill could improve US alignment with the G7 Russia sanctions regime, simplifying the compliance environment. On the downside, a flexible tariff authority could return trade policy whiplash, and secondary tariffs by themselves are unlikely to reroute global energy markets in line with US policy objectives.
Inside the Russia Sanctions Bill
The Lindsey O. Graham Russia Sanctions Act of 2026 passed the Senate 86-11 on August 7, 2026. In its current form, the bill would authorize the President to impose tariffs on the top five importers of Russian oil and gas from the previous 12-month period, the top five countries facilitating Russian oil evasion in the same period and any country that “knowingly made new purchases” of gas or crude at least 30 days after the bill’s enactment. The US Trade Representative will recalculate the top five importers every six months to update enforcement eligibility. Tariff exemptions are allowed for gas importers if they take “significant steps” to reduce Russia-origin supplies or if they comprise less than 15% of Russia’s gas exports (this could exempt Hungary and Slovakia). The bill also directs the President to impose 500% stacked tariffs on Russian imports and prohibits all American investment activity in Russia, potentially stalling US-Russia projects as a dimension of a political settlement to the Russia-Ukraine war.
In addition to those new measures, the Graham bill partially codifies key elements of the post-2022 Russia sanctions regime by directing the President to impose blocking sanctions on much of Russia’s political leadership, energy sector, financial institutions, defense industrial firms and “shadow fleet” oil and gas tankers, as well as entities that enable sanctions circumvention. Those sanctions would be imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) rather than a new authority, preserving executive discretion in determining when to impose sanctions. The President may also waive imposed sanctions if there is written certification that the waiver is in the “national interests” of the US and a report explaining why. That compromise, in preserving executive flexibility, was reportedly a key concession to bridge differences between Congress and the White House.
The presidential waiver authority appears similar to the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act of 2017 (CAATSA). One key difference is that the Graham bill does not specify that waivers must be renewed every 180 days. Nonetheless, by extending the Congressional review framework to sanctions imposed under Executive Order 14042, which has not required the same CAATSA notification standard, the bill could make sanctions relief more procedurally burdensome and politically sensitive, reducing the flexibility of Treasury in handling delisting petitions.
Congressional Outlook Towards Adoption
The Graham bill, stalled since April 2025, may yet become law. Assuming the Republican caucus in the House unites and Democratic Russia hawks support its passage, the bill has the votes. However, the biggest obstacle may be time as the House dashes to complete its agenda in the 15 days in session before the midterms.
A sizable portion of the Democratic caucus likely oppose the bill. After the Senate passed its amended version, Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY), the leading Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, issued a statement arguing that the President would use the expansive discretion and waiver authority to simply not apply most sanctions in the bill, which are already theoretically authorized through IEEPA. Rep. Meeks warns that President Trump could instead weaponize the Graham bill as a new expansive tariff authority against India and China, which were targets of secondary tariffs before they were struck down as unconstitutional in February 2026. Meeks does have some prominent followers in the Democratic caucus, namely Rep. Richard Neal, the ranking member of Ways and Means. Nonetheless, Republican leadership could prioritize the bill and directly bring it to the floor, circumventing Meeks’ ability to procedurally delay the bill through a lengthy markup. Ukraine may also exert political pressure on Democrats to get the bill passed, as it did in late July in the Senate.
Arguably the main factor at play is President Trump. The White House reportedly gave assurances in early July that it would support the bill’s current draft because it gives discretion to the executive on sanctions decisions. But if an amendment narrows the tariff authority or limits waiver discretion, that support could fade. Moreover, other foreign policy matters could seize the White House’s attention. At the end of July, as the US and Iran traded military strikes, President Trump stepped back from earlier assurances and pushed for an equivalent secondary tariff authority for the top five importers of Iranian fuels. The Senate instead extended the Iran Sanctions Act of 1996 from 2026 to 2031. This is a relatively modest concession that would not materially alter the administration’s “maximum pressure” Iran sanctions regime, so Trump may want to revisit the issue.
Speaker Mike Johnson has long suggested that the House will only move on the sanctions bill with Trump’s explicit approval. If Trump’s approval wanes, Johnson may not bring the bill to the floor. If the House did vote on the bill with mixed signals from the White House, it is not clear if Republicans would unite due to the declining influence of the Russia hawks in the party. In May 2026, when a discharge petition forced a vote on the Ukraine Support Act—which would impose far-reaching blocking sanctions and appropriated new money for Ukraine’s defense and reconstruction—only 19 Republicans voted in favor, along with the Democratic caucus.
Assessing the Risks of the Graham Sanctions Bill
If passed, the Graham sanctions bill is unlikely to reroute global energy markets. Imposing secondary tariffs of up to 100%, while costly if enforced, is not as effective a chokepoint as blocking sanctions (i.e., cutting off the American dollar to specific entities). Demand for crude and oil products is inelastic, so while fuels from the Middle East remain cut off due to the Hormuz closure, the costs of withdrawing Russian supplies may be higher for China and India, the two largest importers of Russian fuels, than 100% tariffs distributed across exports to the US, which can be rerouted or even remain competitive at that price point. As it stands, Russia is the main substitute amid the Middle East supply constriction, but there must be substitutes for Russian supplies for the secondary tariff incentive to work.
Moreover, the White House may not enforce a secondary tariff of up to 100% and would likely base decisions on bilateral relationships, treating tariffs as latent negotiating leverage. Indeed, the Trump administration created an identical 100% secondary tariff regime in August 2025 under the now defunct IEEPA authority, ostensibly to force Russia to the negotiating table. However, only India received any penalty (a 25% stacked tariff), and that leverage was contextualized by US-Indian bilateral trade negotiations, which led to a deal and the removal of those tariffs in February 2026. The US would likely hesitate to apply pressure on Beijing, the largest importer of Russian fuels, in a bid to preserve the fragile October 2025 trade truce. However, the tariff card can be a useful escalation if China moves to counter growing export controls imposed by the US Federal Communications Commission on tech products like robots and inverters.
Like in August 2025, India may be the most likely target for secondary tariffs. However, secondary tariffs, if enacted, may not be enough pressure to convince India to change suppliers. Indeed, for the first two months of the secondary tariffs from August to October 2025, Indian refineries kept Russian crude imports stable. Only after US blocking sanctions against Rosneft and Lukoil did Indian refineries scale back, cutting imports from 1.5 million barrels per day (bpd) to 0.94 million bpd in just one week. However, the US paused enforcement of those sanctions first to support diplomacy with Moscow and then to ease global supply pressures after the Iran war began. The US also issued a waiver for Russian crude at sea at the beginning of the war, allowing India to absorb those supplies. This led to India importing a record 2.47 million bpd in July 2026, about half of the country’s fuel imports. Assuming new secondary tariffs have a similar behavioral effect, they will not alter India’s consumption habits.
It is also possible that the Trump administration could apply secondary tariffs on the EU. This is because the US Trade Representative has the discretion to decide how it counts who is an importer of Russian fuels. In total, the EU bought about $1.2 billion in Russian gas in July 2026. Hungary and Slovakia together imported more pipeline gas than China, and France, Spain and Belgium together imported about 49% of all Russian LNG exports. The EU is reducing the volumes of Russian imports, but the administration does not need to apply the exemption if it opts to apply leverage on a trade matter, such as the bloc’s digital regulation.
For business, the upside risk is that the Graham bill will provide a legislative anchor for the US to align with the G7 sanctions regime on Russia, thereby potentially simplifying sanctions compliance obligations. Ukraine will also benefit symbolically as US pressure on the Russian economy marginally increases. In terms of downside risks, business must anticipate the return of a whiplash tariff authority that, while more constrained than IEEPA, can still be wielded to hit the main targets of the 2025 trade war. The bill points toward increased presidential discretion on trade matters.
