WASHINGTON, September 17 — The United States Congress has approved legislation that would allow President Donald Trump to impose tariffs of up to 100 per cent on the five largest importers of Russian oil and natural gas, a measure aimed squarely at Moscow’s leading energy buyers and named for the Republican senator who championed it until his death earlier this year.
The House of Representatives cleared the “Lindsey Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026” on Wednesday by a vote of 262 to 159, sending it to the White House for Trump’s signature. The Senate had passed the bill last month by an overwhelming 86 to 11 margin.
The legislation honours Lindsey Graham, the late Republican senator who passed away in July and who spent his final months in Congress pressing for tougher penalties on Russia.
Tariffs as leverage
The bill authorises Trump to impose tariffs of up to 100 per cent on the five largest importers of Russian oil and natural gas, expanding his favoured tactic of using tariffs to maximise leverage and retribution. While purchasers of Russian energy are not explicitly named in the bill, it is set to target major buyers such as China and India, while potentially exempting countries including Japan, France, Hungary and Belgium, which source smaller shares from Russia and are taking steps to reduce their reliance.
Beyond the tariff authority, the legislation would impose additional measures on Russia’s energy and defence sectors and on its fleet of tankers used to circumvent existing sanctions. It would also slap more sanctions on Iran.
The timing is delicate. The vote comes just days before Chinese President Xi Jinping is expected to arrive in Washington for a bilateral summit with Trump. On Thursday, China pushed back against the bill.
Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun said: “China carries out economic and trade cooperation with countries on the basis of equality and mutual benefit.” He added that the cooperation does not target any third party and should not be disrupted or be under the coercion of any third party, and that “China opposes long-arm jurisdiction that has no basis in international law or the authorisation of the UN Security Council.”
Preparatory talks and a fragile truce
The congressional move coincides with final preparatory talks this weekend between US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Chinese Vice-Premier He Lifeng ahead of Xi’s visit to Washington next week. Both sides are expected to finalise the summit’s likely economic outcomes, including tariff reductions on agricultural trade, while extending the fragile trade truce reached in October last year, the South China Morning Post earlier reported.
The bill targeting Russian oil exports to Beijing and other major buyers adds another layer of economic pressure as Washington presses China to sever commercial ties with Iran under its “Operation Economic Outcast” sanctions campaign.
Bessent said during a House Financial Services Committee hearing on Tuesday: “With China, we have had some very good private discussions, and I look forward to those continuing this weekend when I meet my Chinese counterpart, [Vice-Premier] He Lifeng.” He was responding to a question about the alleged role of Chinese banks in facilitating commercial transactions with Iran and whether Washington planned to take action against them.
During his second term, Trump has tested the limits of his executive authority and used tariffs extensively to pursue both political and economic objectives, including pressuring trading partners to change policies and advancing economic interests. He has recently imposed new tariffs on Canadian goods and Brazilian imports, adding to his broader use of tariffs as a negotiating tool.
Many Democrats in the House opposed the Russia sanctions bill, saying it hands Trump “sweeping new tariff authorities that he can abuse to raise costs on the American people.” Gregory Meeks, a Democratic representative from New York and ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said: “With this language, he would be able to place tariffs on nearly any country he wants, using sanctions evasion as a pretext.” What happens next rests largely on the White House.
Trump’s signature would set the tariff machinery in motion, but the bill’s reach will be tested immediately in the corridors of the Xi summit, where Washington’s push to isolate Moscow and Tehran collides with Beijing’s insistence that its commercial ties are nobody else’s business.
