Trump Signed the Graham Act in September. On Friday Night He Switched It Off
An executive order issued late on Friday waives the 500 per cent tariff on Russian goods, the 100 per cent duties on big buyers of Russian oil and gas, and almost every sanctions provision of the law Congress passed to tighten pressure on Moscow, two days before they were due to take effect.
President Trump signed an executive order on Friday evening implementing, and then suspending, the Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026. Section 2 of the order sets the duties the law requires: a 500 per cent increase on goods from Russia, and 100 per cent on goods from the five largest importers of Russian crude and gas that make new purchases on or after 18 October, and on the five biggest facilitators of sanctions evasion. Section 4 then waives all of them under the law's section 115, which lets the President set aside any sanction, restriction or duty on certifying to Congress that doing so is in the national interest. The order also waives the sanctions provisions in sections 102 to 111 and 117. The waivers last until the President or the Secretary of State decides otherwise.
The law was signed on 18 September and its measures were to bite on Sunday 18 October. Trump has used the 30-day window to leave the statute on the books while disabling its operative parts. The order is careful to say that existing sanctions under the earlier Russia emergency executive orders are unaffected, so nothing that was in force on 17 September has been lifted. What has been removed is everything Congress added. The certification to Congress was submitted; the published order does not say what the national interest basis is.
And the order delegates the waiver power itself to the Secretary of State, which means the law can be switched back on, in part, without another presidential signature.
From the analysisSox wrote when the bill passed that the pressure on Moscow was now real and the test was whether the tariff powers came with clear triggers and an accountable way out. The way out turned out to be the whole door. A bipartisan group of 20 lawmakers wrote to the President on Thursday asking him to let the law take effect, the BBC reports. Senator Graham, who built the bill over two years and died in July, never saw it enforced. The order arrives at the end of a fortnight in which the Treasury licensed Russian diesel imports, the White House announced an energy truce Moscow did not observe, Ukraine's Starshield terminals were throttled, and Kyiv resumed striking refineries, to the President's public displeasure.
The economics are not mysterious. Diesel is above $6 a gallon in the United States, distillate inventories are 12 per cent below a year ago, September CPI printed 3.7 per cent and the midterms are on 3 November. A 100 per cent duty on goods from India and China, the two largest buyers of Russian crude, would have been a second tariff shock on top of the first, and a 500 per cent duty on Russian goods would have covered the diesel the administration has just agreed to buy. The waiver is the price-of-fuel policy that the Treasury's diesel licence began.
We think Congress wrote this outcome into the law and should say so before blaming the man who used it. Section 115 required nothing of the President beyond a certification and a report. A sanctions statute whose every provision can be waived on a one-line finding of national interest is a statement of intent, and intent is what Moscow has been reading since the diesel deal. If the Senate wants the law to mean what it says, the fix is a waiver clause that expires, requires a vote to renew, or cannot be applied to the duties and the sanctions at once. That is the rules-before-reach argument Sox made in September, and the reach has now been shown to be optional.
Two questions remain. The report to Congress explaining the national interest basis is required by section 115(b); whether it is published will tell markets whether this is a fuel-price pause or a settlement posture. And the order delegates the waiver power itself to the Secretary of State, which means the law can be switched back on, in part, without another presidential signature. The Senate returns on 9 November. The duties it voted for were due on Sunday.
The Semaform
President Trump issued an executive order on 16 October waiving the duties and nearly all sanctions provisions of the Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act, certifying to Congress that the waiver is in the national interest, two days before the measures were due to take effect.
Congress built a sanctions law with a waiver clause that asks nothing but a certification, and the President has used it. If lawmakers want the law to bind, the waiver must expire, require renewal by vote, or exclude the duties.
The administration says the waiver serves the national interest and leaves existing sanctions intact; Democrats and a bipartisan group of 20 lawmakers say it neutralises a law passed to pressure Moscow and rewards Russia while it strikes Ukrainian energy infrastructure.
Sources
- The White House, Executive Order: Implementing the Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026, 16 October 2026
- Reuters, Trump waives key Russia-related sanctions, tariffs before they were to take effect, 17 October 2026
- BBC News, Trump waives several Russia sanctions as new US law takes effect, 17 October 2026
- Politico, Trump issues order to bypass Russian sanctions in bill named for late Lindsey Graham, 16 October 2026
- ABC News, Trump signs order waiving Graham Act sanctions on Russia, 16 October 2026
- Sox News, The Russia Sanctions Law Has Changed the Question From Reach to Rules, 20 September 2026
- Sox News, Washington Loosens Russia Sanctions for a Diesel Promise, 10 October 2026
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