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Bipartisan senators introduce Russia sanctions and tariff bill Graham championed

▶ Watch Video: Here’s what Lindsey Graham told Margaret Brennan about his Ukraine visit one day before his death

A bipartisan group of senators introduced a bill championed by Sen. Lindsey Graham that would impose sanctions on top Russian figures and heavy tariffs on the biggest buyers of Russian oil. 

The “Sanctioning Russia Act of 2026” aims to squeeze Russian leaders in an effort to bring the Kremlin’s four-year war on Ukraine to an end. It would target Russia’s energy sector, a significant revenue source for its Ukraine war, by placing financial penalties on purchasers of those products. The White House has signaled its support for the bill, CBS News reported last week.

The text of the bill had been finalized before Graham met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy last week in Kyiv, according to a Senate aide. Graham died suddenly Saturday shortly after he returned to the U.S. 

“Passing this legislation right now would be a fitting tribute to Senator Graham’s fierce support for Ukraine’s freedom,” Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut said in a statement Tuesday.

The measure would impose mandatory sanctions on Russian President Vladimir Putin, his top deputies, the Russian military, Russian banks and energy companies, foreign entities doing business with Russia and Russia’s shadow fleet of oil tankers.

It would block Americans from buying Russian debt or doing business with the Russian government or its energy sector. 

Tariffs of up to 100% would be imposed on the top five purchasers of Russian oil, currently China, India, Slovakia, Hungary and Azerbaijan.

And the top five purchasers of Russian natural gas would also face tariffs: China, France, Belgium, Japan and Hungary. Countries whose natural gas purchases account for less than 15% of Russia’s total natural gas exports would be exempted. 

Under the legislation, the U.S. would reevaluate the top five purchasers of Russian energy every 180 days. Lawmakers hope to push these countries to buy energy from alternate sources to increase financial pressure on Moscow. 

The president would have the flexibility to exempt certain entities if he provides justification to Congress.

“Putin’s war against Ukraine has claimed hundreds of thousands of lives, and it must end. Lindsey [Graham] believed that getting this legislation passed and signed into law would be the most consequential thing he achieved in his career,” GOP Sen. Katie Britt of Alabama said in a statement Tuesday. 

By 1 p.m. Tuesday, 26 cosponsors supported the bill, and that number was expected to grow, Senate aides said.

GOP Rep. Mike Turner of Ohio, who traveled with Graham to Kyiv, said Sunday that he’s hopeful the Senate will soon pass the bill as “one of the legacies” of Graham, who died suddenly Saturday.

Republican Rep. Michael McCaul of Texas said in a post on X Sunday that he plans to introduce a House version of the Russia sanctions legislation this week, urging Congress to “pass it in his honor.”

A NASA observatory will likely reenter Earth’s atmosphere this year after rescue effort falls short

By CNN
(CNN) — A satellite called LINK that recently launched to boost the orbit of a falling space observatory won’t be able to carry out its daring rescue mission after all.NASA’s decades-old Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory is steadily losing altitude and in danger of reentering Earth’s atmosphere. Designed by Arizona-based Katalyst Space Technologies to save the observatory, the LINK satellite began to encounter difficulty in late July. Just weeks after LINK lifted off on July 3, it started to spin out of control.Katalyst was able to regain control of the satellite, but the company acknowledged that the issue cost it time, which would delay LINK’s rendezvous with Swift by about a month. However, that postponement — at least initially — did not seem to be a deterrent to the mission.Now, NASA and Katalyst have announced that LINK’s mission will not capture and boost Swift to a higher orbit “due to ongoing attitude control issues,” according to statements Wednesday.Swift’s science mission will come to an end as the observatory likely burns up in Earth’s atmosphere later this year, according to NASA.“NASA should be willing to move quickly and take smart risks when the potential return is worth it, and that is exactly what we did with this mission,” NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said in a statement.“This is not the outcome we were working toward, but it does not change why this mission was worth attempting. The team moved with extraordinary speed to give Swift a chance to carry out more science while advancing capabilities America will need for satellite servicing in the future.”But LINK’s journey isn’t over yet, and the lessons learned could be instrumental for future in-space servicing operations.Demonstrating future capabilitiesThe mission team is forging ahead with its plan for LINK to rendezvous with Swift — but as a demonstration rather than a rescue.“We are going to learn everything we can from LINK’s rendezvous attempt and put those lessons to work on the missions that follow,” Isaacman said.Originally, LINK was expected to conduct a survey of Swift to determine the best grappling points on the observatory, a step that will likely be part of the satellite’s anticipated rendezvous, though it’s currently unclear when this test will take place.Swift wasn’t designed to be serviced in space, which means that insights from the demonstration could be used for future missions.“Katalyst designed, developed, and launched an experimental spacecraft to go after an ambitious mission on an aggressive timeline,” said Ghonhee Lee, CEO of Katalyst Space Technologies, in a statement. “We took on this high-risk, high-reward challenge and are proud of the milestones we reached along the way. We have already learned a tremendous amount, and now our job is to turn those lessons into something durable — building a repeatable playbook to inform future rendezvous and proximity operations and satellite servicing.”Filling the gapThe Swift observatory, which has no established observational replacement waiting in the wings, has served as an astrophysics multitool in low-Earth orbit since it launched nearly 22 years ago, quickly pivoting to observe celestial objects and cosmic events.But atmospheric drag, intensified by solar activity, exerted its forces on the observatory, leading NASA to predict that Swift would reenter Earth’s atmosphere once it dips below an optimal altitude of about 185 miles (300 kilometers) above Earth.Katalyst designed, built, tested and launched LINK in nine months. The robotic satellite lifted off on a Northrop Grumman Pegasus XL rocket, which was released midair by the company’s modified L-1011 aircraft, Stargazer.Before the satellite’s launch, members of the Swift and LINK teams both acknowledged that the path to boosting the observatory was full of risks that could cause the mission to fail.“We were all hoping for more science from Swift,” said Shawn Domagal-Goldman, director of the Astrophysics Division at NASA headquarters in Washington, DC. “But we knew the takeaways from this mission would be worthwhile either way, and we have gained so much through the series of accomplishments up to this point.”The agency will rely on the rest of its fleet of active observatories to fill Swift’s gap and “will continue to prioritize finding new options to react rapidly to cosmic events,” according to NASA.“Building, testing, and operating this mission has already strengthened America’s space industry pipeline, advancing in-space servicing capabilities in completely new ways,” Domagal-Goldman said. “NASA is committed to supporting our commercial vendors as they take on difficult tasks with the agency, to push the boundaries of what’s possible.”The-CNN-Wire™ & © 2026 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.
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