Zelenskyy’s direct plea helped unlock Russia sanctions in the Senate

Zelenskyy at the U.S. Capitol in July surrounded by senators [AP Photo]

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy arrived at the U.S. Capitol hours after Lindsey Graham’s funeral to an unusually attentive audience.

Half the Senate gathered for the closed-door meeting. Senators set their mobile phones down and focused their attention. Along with representatives from the House, they listened as Zelenskyy fielded questions about his country’s strategy in the long war against Russia.

Zelenskyy told them how Ukraine was repelling the Russian invasion, taking the fight to Moscow, but in need of U.S. help with Patriot interceptor missiles and licensing agreements, expanded access to Elon Musk’s Starlink internet — and most immediately ahead of a Senate vote that July night — a punishing Russia sanctions package to deprive President Vladimir Putin of the oil and gas revenue fueling the war machine.

“He said, ‘We need this legislation,’” recalled Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, in an interview this week. “Both the troops and the Ukrainian people need this for morale.”

“You could feel palpably in the room a sense that — Zelenskyy’s confidence of their ability to hold and to persevere,” said Rep. Steny Hoyer of Maryland, a former Democratic leader. “There was a sense in the room that, look, we can be successful.”

The massive Russian sanctions package from the late Sen. Graham represented the most ambitious effort to support Ukraine since President Donald Trump returned to the White House.

After two years of legislative inaction, it would be one of the few moves from Congress since lawmakers sent supplemental aid funding to Ukraine in 2024.

The Senate advanced the sanctions bill that night, with Zelenskyy taking a rare seat in the chamber to watch the proceedings — senators waving and flashing a thumbs-up as they cast votes. Days later, it sailed to passage, on a vote of 86-11, sending the Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia Act to the House.

But next steps are highly uncertain. House Speaker Mike Johnson helms a Republican majority reluctant to tangle itself in U.S. affairs overseas. And many Democrats supportive of Ukraine warn the bill would hand Trump too much tariff authority with no real checks from Congress.

Daniel Balson, of the pro-democracy advocacy group Razom for Ukraine, is pressing Congress not to lose momentum.

“It’s important not to underestimate symbolically what this would mean,” Balson said. “It would show Ukrainians that, hiccups and all, there is still an international alliance that stands behind Ukraine’s fight.”

It wasn’t the first time Zelenskyy arrived to a hero’s welcome in Washington, and may not be the last.

But in between there have been moments of grave uncertainty in what has become a long war, longer than World War I.

Zelenskyy first appeared on a private video call with lawmakers in March 2022, days after the start of the war, when he urged the U.S. to send planes to help Ukraine defend its skies from the Russian bombardment. That winter, Zelenskyy delivered a dramatic Christmas-time address to Congress, giving thanks to “every American” in a speech evocative of British Prime Minister Winston Churchill’s own visit during World War II.

But Congress abandoned another round of Ukraine funds in 2023 as Republicans aligned themselves with Trump, who was on track as the Republican Party’s front-runner to retake the White House.

And once Trump returned to power in 2025, action on Ukraine aid ground to a halt. Trump berated Zelenskyy during a high-profile Oval Office meeting, deriding Zelenskyy’s “hatred” for Putin as a roadblock to peace.

“This has largely hinged on President Trump,” said Republican Rep. Don Bacon of Nebraska, a former Air Force brigadier general, who explained that more Republicans would publicly stand with Ukraine if Trump gave the nod.

Still, Zelenskyy kept Congress close, meeting with lawmakers abroad and returning to the U.S. Capitol as he did after Graham’s funeral in Washington on July 28.

Republican Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina said Zelenskyy has endured a “kind of a baptism by fire since he’s been president in the middle of war, trying to manage confusing messages coming out of Washington.”

It took Graham essentially a full year to bring Trump on board with the Russia sanctions package, and when he did he immediately shared the news with Senate colleagues last month at the NATO summit in Turkey. Graham, who then flew on to Kyiv, died days later back in Washington, likely of a torn aorta.

Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, who had partnered with Graham during the lengthy process, said Graham told him that winning Trump’s approval was a “BFD,” slang for a really big deal.

At its core, the bill seeks to deprive Moscow of oil and gas revenues by pressuring China, India and other customers not to buy Russian energy. It would allow Trump to impose sweeping tariffs up to 100% on goods from those countries entering the U.S.

Liberal Democrats have misgivings — not with Zelenskyy or Ukraine — but with the bill’s tariff powers, which they worry Trump will deploy in ways Congress cannot control. LISA MASCARO, WASHINGTON, MDT/AP