House Democrats are about to walk into a trap of their own making — and they have no good options.
A Senate-passed Russia sanctions bill is heading to the House floor this week, putting Democrats in an impossible bind: vote to punish Vladimir Putin’s war machine, or vote to block President Trump from gaining expanded tariff authority they’ve spent years attacking.
The legislation — named after the late Sen. Lindsey Graham, who died unexpectedly in July at 71 — sailed through the Senate with Democratic support. Now the House Rules Committee has teed it up for a Wednesday vote.
And Democrats are squirming.
“We’re going to continue to stand by the Ukrainian people and find a path forward to get a sanctions bill done while addressing the very real concerns that [Democrats] have raised about giving Donald Trump authority that the Supreme Court recently made clear he does not currently have.”
That was House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries during a Monday press conference, trying to thread a needle that may not exist.
The bill would direct Trump to impose up to 500% tariffs on Russia and up to 100% tariffs on countries buying Russian energy. It would also mandate significant sanctions on Russian officials fueling the Ukraine war.
Democrats have railed against Trump’s tariff policies for years — particularly his duties on allies like Canada and Mexico, which sparked court battles nationwide. Senior House Democrats said earlier this year they would oppose the Graham bill for exactly this reason.
Rep. Gregory Meeks, D-N.Y., ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, joined Reps. Richard Neal, D-Mass., and Don Beyer, D-Va., in a joint statement slamming the legislation: “House Democrats are rock solid in our support for Ukraine, but the Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia And Iran Act would do more harm than good. This bill would dramatically expand presidential tariff authorities while failing to mandate sanctions on Russia, both of which are unacceptable.”
Yet Senate Democrats largely voted YES — handing Trump the very tariff powers they claim to oppose.
The package, pushed by Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., and Graham, sat in purgatory for nearly two years while lawmakers and the administration negotiated language Trump and Congress could both accept. Blumenthal defended the tariff provisions to Fox News Digital, arguing courts would restrain Trump if he overstepped: “If Donald Trump wants to break this law, he will be restrained by the courts, just as when he broke the law on tariffs previously.”
That logic didn’t satisfy progressives like Sens. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., who raised alarms in the Senate. But the Democratic caucus overwhelmingly gave Trump a thumbs-up anyway.
The breakthrough came after Sen. Raphael Warnock, D-Ga., received guarantees from U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer that the tariffs baked into the sanctions package would be limited to the top five energy trading partners with the Kremlin.
Now House Democrats face the same choice — but with a twist. Speaker Johnson needs Democratic votes to pass the bill, because an increasingly vocal isolationist wing of the House GOP Conference is balking at the Ukraine provisions.
The House votes on a procedural rule Tuesday afternoon. If that passes, the full sanctions bill hits the floor Wednesday.
Democrats have spent years claiming Trump abuses tariff authority. Now they’ll either hand him more of it — or vote against punishing Putin.
