Source: Philips O'Brien Substack posts. Excerpted

Well, this was a week in which the Trump administration announced “sanctions” on two Russian oil companies. I wrote two pieces on these [here and here] to try and explain what they do, and what they do not do. Crucially, they contain no automatic secondary sanctions at all (the kinds that matter). These are sanctions that would apply to Chinese and Indian companies, for instance, which do business with Russia over oil. The secondary sanctions are the key ones, as has been clear for a while, because to really damage the Russian economy, you need to stop people from doing business with it [...]

Of course what did not get the attention that it deserved was that this week also saw the Trump administration maneuver to, once again, block progress on the sanctions bill that could really damage Russia. I’m talking about the sanctions in the proposed Graham-Blumenthal act. This bill,
co-sponsored by Senators Lindsey Graham and Richard Blumenthal, empowers the president to use crippling secondary sanctions of the type that the sanctions announced this week lack. Indeed the Graham-Blumenthal bill would be a massive blow to Russia’s economy, because the secondary sanctions would be so strong (up to 100% in some instances) that it would end many of the economic relationships that are keeping Russia afloat. The crucial role of the secondary sanctions was stressed by Blumenthal and Graham jointly when the bill was announced in April.

“However, the ultimate hammer to bring about the end of this war will be tariffs against countries, like China, India and Brazil, that prop up Putin’s war machine by purchasing cheap Russian oil and gas. President Trump’s decision to announce the implementation of 100 percent secondary tariffs on countries that buy Russian oil and gas if a peace agreement is not reached in the next 50 days is a real executive hammer to drive the parties to the negotiating table. The goal is not more tariffs and sanctions – the goal is to entice Putin to come to the peace table."

In other words, had Trump really been interested in using oil sanctions against secondary parties to hurt Russia, he has and has had a ready made bill at his disposal, and has for six months. Remarkably and sadly, however, this bill has gone nowhere even though it is now being cosponsored by almost 90 Senators. It could pass the Senate in a heartbeat without any effort, and yet it never gets a vote.

And it never gets a vote because Trump, as he did again this week, always blocks a vote in the end. Ten days ago, the leader of Senate Republicans, Senator John Thune, publicly stated that it was time to give Graham-Blumenthal a vote. According to Thune, Graham has been in regular touch with the White House and now the details had been worked out on a vote. Thune’s words were: “It’s ready. … I think it’s time to move,”

Well, turned out a few days later it was not ready and there would be no upcoming move. As soon as Trump’s weak sanctions were announced, Graham-Blumenthal was once again shelved for the foreseeable future. According to Thune this week, the bill is now on “pause” again, and now he has no idea when or even if the bill will ever have a vote.

It was a fascinating and exact repeat of exactly what happened in July. Then Thune and Trump both spoke of supporting Graham-Blumenthal and bringing it up for a vote. On July 9, the New York Times, published this story in which Thune discussed a vote that month and Trump said he was strongly considering supporting the bill [...] 

Of course, in the end in July there was no vote, Trump was not actually supportive of Graham-Blumenthal and the bill went nowhere.

Twice now the Trump administration has used Republicans in the Senate to make it seem that they will support real sanctions against Russia, before pulling the rug out on the plan each time.

So yes, until secondary sanctions are actually introduced and enforced on the broad number of Chinese, Indian, Turkish and Brazilian companies that do business with Russia, I will continue to stress that what Trump is actually doing is protecting Russia.

Why is he so afraid of Graham-Blumenthal?

Ukrainian Ranged Sanctions are far more effective

One of the reasons that secondary sanctions are the test of the Trump administration’s true intentions, is that the Ukrainians have had such success against Russian oil refining that the Russian state has had to stop the exportation of refined oil to keep whatever they can produce for their own domestic consumption.

BTW: All Russia can afford to do now is export unrefined crude oil which is refined in other countries and none of which is making its way to the USA. Thus sanctioning US citizens and companies from doing business with two Russian oil companies is a bit like sanctioning US companies from doing business with medieval France. It is sanctioning transactions that do not exist [emphasis added].