President Donald Trump has waived extensive new Russia-related sanctions and tariffs under the Graham Act, preventing those measures from taking effect as prescribed while leaving existing executive-order sanctions in place.
The October 16 order invokes the national-interest waiver in the Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act, signed on September 18. It is not a repeal of that law.
Congress built the waiver into section 115. Before using it, the president must send Congress a written national-interest certification and an explanation. Trump’s order says those submissions have been made; the order itself does not reproduce the accompanying explanation.
The legislation otherwise directs action across Russian financial institutions, state-linked entities, money transfers, investment, energy and other areas. It also provides for substantially higher import duties on Russian goods and goods from specified countries buying Russian energy or facilitating sanctions evasion.
The order sets out a 500 per cent tariff increase for Russian goods and 100 per cent increases for the specified third-country categories, but expressly waives application of the duties. Reading the tariff provisions without the waiver would therefore misstate their immediate effect.
The statutory third-country provisions distinguish major importers making new purchases after the relevant deadline from leading facilitators of sanctions evasion. The order directs US trade officials to monitor purchases and evasion and advise on further action.
The waiver is broad but does not erase every US restriction affecting Russia. The order expressly preserves measures under existing executive orders addressing harmful Russian government activities, including sanctions against people already covered by those orders.
Congress also provided a separate mechanism for terminating measures, with different substantive conditions and review provisions. This order instead uses the waiver route. The waivers continue until the president or designated officials determine that further action is appropriate; no fixed expiry date is stated.
