Are Russia Sanctions in US Senate Going Sideways?

Following the tragic passing of Sen. Lindsey Graham, Congressional leaders and the White House worked together to advance S.5025 – the Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia Act of 2026. Ninety-nine Senators agree that the bill needs to be fast-tracked and passed through the Senate this week.JOIN US ON TELEGRAMFollow our coverage of the war on the @Kyivpost_official. One Senator, Raphael Warnock, a Democrat from Georgia, has put a hold on the bill, threatening to delay a vote until September or later. This is not good. You can’t get 99 Senators to agree on what time it is. This sort of unanimity is rarely seen and sorely needed in Congress. It is coming at the right time on the right topic. I worked for seven years on Capitol Hill. Time is not the friend of legislative coalitions. If this is delayed until September – September of an election year – you can be sure Senators will start peeling off. Sen. Warnock may have legitimate policy concerns on the bill, but 46 of his Democratic colleagues have looked past them to get relief to Ukraine. Warnock is putting the bill – and Ukrainian lives – at risk. Ukraine is at a crucial time in its fight against the Russian invader. Ukraine is winning by almost any metric. Putin has lost more than 1.4 million soldiers. Black smoke from Ukrainian drone and missile attacks is a regular feature on the Moscow skyline. He has spent by some measures a trillion dollars on the war and his economy is verging on collapse. Other Topics of Interest Wildberries Warehouse Damaged in Latest Ukrainian Drone Strike as Russia Reports 600+ UAVs Downed Russian officials said drone debris damaged a Wildberries logistics warehouse in the Tver region after a large-scale overnight Ukrainian drone attack. The only metric by which Putin is winning is that he is killing more civilians using drones, ballistic missiles and cruise missiles on Ukrainian cities. As an example, Putin’s August 4 attack on Ukraine, which I watched out my window, cost nearly $100 million – about 3 hours of fossil fuel sales. Any and all efforts we can take to cut off his revenue from fossil fuels saves Ukrainian lives and brings an earlier end to this war. Ukrainian drones take out the Moscow Oil Refinery, which supplies about 40% of the gasoline and half the diesel fuel for Moscow. The smoke could easily be seen from the Kremlin, about nine miles away. Ukrainian sanctions are working, but they could use help from Congress. Ukraine has implemented kinetic sanctions, taking out about half of Russia’s capacity to refine crude with their home-made missiles and drones. Sen. Warnock and the Senate need to follow suit. Ninety-nine Senators are in agreement on this bill at this moment. Given the volatility of American politics, we don’t know how long this will last. See the original on the author’s blog, Tales from World War III, here. The views expressed in this opinion article are the author’s and not necessarily those of Kyiv Post.