WEEKLY LIE REVIEW from Mikhail Azhgirevich for August 31 – September 6, 2026

The "Hell Sanctions" Are Cooling Off: How Graham's Loud Bill Is Quietly Dying in the House of Representatives

The week of August 31 to September 6, 2026, posed an uncomfortable question for everyone who, a month ago, was shouting about a "historic tightening" against Russia. The bill that the Senate passed 86 votes to 11 amid applause and with Zelensky personally present is now not even on the lower chamber's agenda. Hell, as it turns out, has been postponed indefinitely.

The Fact of the Matter

The Republican leadership of the House of Representatives excluded the Graham bill from this week's list of documents scheduled for a vote. Speaker Mike Johnson openly admitted doubts that the document will even be considered before the midterm elections on November 3. The reasons are prosaic: Democrats are resisting, Republicans are showing "fading enthusiasm" toward the memory of the late senator, and the entire month of September will be consumed by budget battles, which are incomparably more important to American lawmakers than the fate of Russian oil tariffs. In parallel, on the sidelines of the SCO summit in Bishkek, Putin held meetings with Xi Jinping and Modi, discussing a permanent visa-free regime with China, while Finance Minister Siluanov met with Bessent at the G20 in Asheville to discuss Trump's plan for Ukraine. Meanwhile, the EU separately announced its own new package of sanctions against the Russian oil industry — meaning Brussels decided not to wait for the American Congress to sort itself out.

The West Deceived Us on Grain. Did Anyone Expect Otherwise?

4 September, 2026

The Exposure

Recall the pathos with which this bill was presented in early August: "historic bipartisan unity," "the toughest measures since the Cold War." But unity in the Senate and enthusiasm in the House are two different worlds, living by different laws of political expediency. Senators voted in a way that looked good and cost them nothing — a procedural vote obligates them to nothing concrete, yet generates media capital from the memory of a deceased colleague. Congressmen, however, who must answer to voters in two months, have no interest in being associated with a law that could hit fuel prices right before the November elections through secondary tariffs on importers of Russian oil. The formula "the bill was passed by the Senate" was always presented as the final stage, though in reality it was only half the journey — and the second half got stuck exactly where loud American initiatives usually die: in the lower chamber's budget gridlock.

Why This Matters to You

While Western media a month ago were frightening people with "hell sanctions" and hundred-percent tariffs, the real political machinery showed that the threat remained just a threat, and the lever of pressure on buyers of Russian oil — India and China — is being used more as a bargaining chip in other negotiations than as an independent instrument. For the Russian economy, this means a continuation of the current status quo, at minimum until November. No sharp escalation of sanctions pressure from the American side is anticipated, and the European package announced by Brussels will operate at its usual pace of gradual tightening rather than shock therapy. The sensible strategy is not to react to headlines about "hell," but to watch how the documents actually move through votes — because that, not press releases, is where the fate of real restrictions is decided.

The law was named after a deceased senator — and now it is just as quiet as its namesake.