The US House of Representatives could this week hand President Trump the power to impose tariffs of up to 100% on the five biggest buyers of Russian oil and gas. The Senate approved the bill 86-11 on 8 August, and the House Rules Committee took it up on Monday, with a floor vote expected later this week — Congress's last real window before midterm campaigning consumes September and October, according to ABC News.

The bill carries the name of the late Senator Lindsey Graham, who died on 11 July after more than a year steering it through the Senate, Al Jazeera reports. Beyond tariffs, it sanctions the reflagged tankers Russia uses to evade Western price caps, hits Russian financial institutions, and names Putin and senior officials directly, per ABC News. One clause matters most for Brussels: countries importing under 15% of their gas from Russia, with a reduction plan in place, are exempt. In practice that spares the EU, which is not among the top five importers the bill targets, while China and India are.

The bill still has real friction points. It gives the president waiver authority to lift sanctions if he judges it in the national interest, and some House Democrats warn the tariff power itself "could be used without restraint" against allies, not just Russia's buyers, ABC News reports. Three Democratic committee ranking members argue the measure would "do more harm than good" and want it renegotiated instead.

Kyiv and Brussels are already positioning around a bill that isn't law yet. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called Senate passage "a very important historical moment," per ABC News, and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen welcomed it, saying "together, let us drain Russia's means to continue a war it cannot win," according to Al Jazeera.

Watch whether Trump actually fires the tariff authority at China and India, or waives it, and whether the 15% threshold keeps EU states aligned with Washington's sanctions regime or exposes gaps in their own remaining Russian gas imports.