The House of Representatives will likely vote this week on the Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026, after the Senate passed the bill 86–11 in August. The bill seeks to put more economic pressure on Russia due to its ongoing invasion of Ukraine, including by increasing tariffs on countries buying Russian energy products. Whether this effectively squeezes Russia indirectly—an assessment best left to national security experts—this grant of authority would result in a major tax hike for Americans.

Section 113 of the bill directs the president to increase the duty rate on every good from the five largest buyers of Russian crude oil or natural gas that continue purchasing after the bill’s enactment, as well as countries found to be helping Moscow evade oil sanctions, to up to 100 percent. As we’ve previously explained, one problem with the bill is that it does not specify how to construct the official list of targeted countries, thus giving the president wide authority to pick and choose new US tariff targets. Nevertheless, we can get an idea of the magnitude of the president’s new unilateral tariff powers by examining historical import volumes from the five countries most likely to top the crude list—China, India, Türkiye, Slovakia and Hungary. 

If we assume that new tariffs under this proposed law applied to 2025 imports from these five countries and were raised from their current, most-favored-nation level to 100 percent—the ceiling set by the bill—it would equate to $408 billion in additional yearly import taxes. Given that tariff pass-through has been estimated at 53 percent to 100 percent by research on the 2025 tariffs, a back-of-the-napkin calculation suggests that the tariff costs borne by American importers would range from $216 to $408 billion, or about $1,605 to $3,028 per US household, on an annual basis and keeping import levels fixed. [1]

This is, again, a rudimentary, back-of-the-napkin calculation rife with uncertainty. One hundred percent is the maximum rate to which the president can raise tariffs under the bill, so this figure is a ceiling. Furthermore, a high tariff would surely push American companies and consumers to shift away from targeted imports to higher-priced alternatives, meaning less direct tariff costs (and revenues) on a dynamic basis. On the other hand, the figure above omits other costs—shortages, higher domestic and import prices, increased policy uncertainty, foreign retaliation, and more—that the tariffs would inflict on the US economy. Trade that vanishes is not a savings. And despite the president’s insistence to the contrary, the overwhelming evidence suggests Americans are paying most of the costs generated by the tariffs he has previously implemented, in whatever form those costs take. 

Just as importantly, the estimate assumes that tariffs are imposed on these five countries only, but the law doesn’t mandate the target countries (or even a methodology for determining them). Since tariffs would apply to countries that were among the five largest buyers of Russian crude oil or natural gas and that continued purchasing after the bill’s enactment—as well as countries found to be among the top five “facilitators” of sanctions evasion—the list could extend beyond the five countries used in our estimate. 

Moreover, the bill does not specify which data determine the rankings, which can lead to inconsistent results: Azerbaijan, for instance, has been previously identified as a large importer of Russian energy by the bill’s proponents. Meanwhile, customs data aggregated by the United Nations places Japan and France among the top five Russian gas importers. But additional data from non-customs sources (i.e., Gazprom and the Turkish energy market regulator) suggests both countries’ imports amount to less than 15 percent of Russia’s total exports, which would exempt them from tariffs under the statute.

Still, the $408 billion figure remains a handy way to understand the amount of power Congress is poised to give away. It’s a lot.

And, as we’ve learned over the last 18 months, once Congress gives away its tariff powers, they’re almost impossible to get back. In April 2025, the president taxed imports from virtually every country under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), a statute the Supreme Court held in February confers no tariff authority. Shortly after the Supreme Court’s rebuke, the administration then claimed the United States faced large and serious balance-of-payments deficits and used Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974—a provision largely inapplicable to a world of floating exchange rates—to impose 10 percent tariffs on a similar list of products previously covered by IEEPA. The Court of International Trade then held those tariffs were unlawful in May. Those temporary tariffs lapsed in July, and an appeal is pending. The same day the Sec. 122 tariffs lapsed, the administration imposed replacement tariffs under Section 301 of the same act on 60 countries based on highly questionable findings that each country failed to sufficiently ban forced-labor imports.

Meanwhile, the president has used Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962 to justify additional tariffs under the guise that imports of upholstered furniture, kitchen cabinets, and bathroom vanities (among other everyday products) “threaten to impair the national security” of the United States. And now the Trump administration is waging a trade war with its longstanding ally and second-largest trading partner, Canada, under the auspices of Canadian “discrimination” against US products using Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930—a provision that had never been used before to impose duties and that legal experts believe has been effectively superseded by subsequently enacted tariff authorities and is illegal, regardless. Every tariff statute in that sequence was written by previous Congresses, and President Trump has exploited the gaps and ambiguities in each of them to stretch his tariff powers.

Thus far, this Congress has failed to claw back any of those authorities, and the Graham sanctions bill features many of the pitfalls found in the other trade statutes: It names no data source for determining the list of tariff countries, as noted. It provides for a discretionary reduction of the tariff for a country that ceases to purchase Russian energy, but a wholesale elimination must wait until the executive branch reassesses the list of top 5 importers every 180 days. It gives the executive branch much discretion for approving tariff reductions or exemptions in the case of gas-importing countries. And it gives Congress no power to block the tariffs or reject the president’s methodology for determining the list of countries subject to them.

Years of evidence suggest that Congress is not concerned about the separation of powers or protecting its constitutionally delegated tax, tariff, and trade authorities. But members of Congress should consider their self-interest. The midterm elections are less than two months away, and the American people are very concerned about the cost of living and price increases—and the president’s tariffs are deeply unpopular. Giving the president more authority to impose tariffs—and increase prices for the items covered—seems unwise politically. Supporting Ukraine need not require hundreds of billions of dollars in additional taxes on import-consuming Americans.

If the House insists on a tariff section for the bill, there are fixes that could markedly improve it. First, Congress should specify the data source used to determine target countries. Second, the bill should clarify that any duties imposed pursuant to its tariff authorities expire along with the authorities themselves after five years. Third, Congress should cap the tariff rate well below 100 percent (these duties already stack on top of other tariffs imposed by the executive through the other statutes mentioned above). Finally, the bill should require an affirmative vote of Congress before any tariff takes effect.

Congress should look for ways to restrain the executive branch’s discretionary tariff authorities, not expand them further.