US President Donald Trump said on Sunday that Republicans should add Iran to the Russian sanctions bill.
The bill, first introduced in April 2025, has seen recent momentum after having been stalled in Congress while Trump seeks to negotiate with Russian President Vladimir Putin to end his war with Ukraine.
Graham had announced a breakthrough before his death, saying that a deal was reached with the White House to move forward on the long-stalled Russia sanctions package.
“Republicans should add Iran to the Russian Sanctions Bill,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “That’s what Lindsey wanted to do, and it was going to happen. IMPORTANT!!!”
The Trump administration has, for over a week, resumed its conflict with Iran with a series of attacks and an end to negotiations to end the conflict that started with joint US and Israeli strikes on Iran in late February.
The US military launched retaliatory attacks Saturday in response to Iranian strikes that saw two service members killed in Jordan.
Trump has called these deaths “a very sad thing.”
U.S. Central Command (Centcom) said the latest strikes were intended to further degrade Tehran’s ability to threaten commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz and “punish” the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps forces that launched missiles and drones against US soldiers in Jordan the day before.
Trump’s call to include Iran in the bill comes as he is signaling more support for Ukraine in the face of Putin’s refusal to end his war with Kyiv.
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), the ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) have said Graham’s bill, the Sanctioning Russia Act of 2025, would be a fitting tribute to his legacy.
Thune said it’s something lawmakers have “been interested in for a long time.”
Shaheen and Graham were part of the bipartisan group of senators who had previously announced the White House’s support for the bill before Graham’s death.
Democrats have been concerned about the bill’s text, which grants the president sweeping tariff authorities, an issue raised while those authorities were the subject of a then-pending Supreme Court case.
This latest version of the bill also codifies sanctions already imposed through executive orders, making it much more difficult for a future president to terminate them outright.
