The United States Senate is scheduled to hold an initial procedural vote Tuesday on a Russia sanctions package named after the late Senator Lindsey Graham.
The bipartisan bill aims to hamper Russian military action in Ukraine and had secured presidential support shortly before Graham's unexpected death on July 11 at age 71.
Graham's remains arrived at the U. S.
Capitol Rotunda for an official honor ceremony ahead of a national funeral service at Washington National Cathedral.
Foreign leaders, including Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, plan to attend the cathedral proceedings alongside President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune emphasized the personal loss felt by lawmakers across party lines while announcing the Capitol tributes.
"For so many of us in the Senate and the House, myself included, Lindsey was more than a colleague, he was a friend," Thune said.
The South Carolina Republican served in federal legislature for over three decades after his election during the 1994 congressional midterms.
Following an early career as a prosecutor in the Air Force Judge Advocate General's Corps, Graham gained national attention as a House manager during the impeachment trial of President Bill Clinton before winning a Senate seat in 2002.
After criticizing Trump on January 6, 2021, Graham later re-established a close advisory role with the former president.
"Count me out. Enough is enough," Graham said during a Senate floor speech on January 6, 2021.
Despite his public split from Trump that night, Graham re-engaged with the president weeks later at the Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida to maintain legislative influence during Trump's political campaigns.
His position evolved into acting as an informal intermediary between foreign diplomats and the administration on national security matters.
The two-day memorial schedule concludes Wednesday with a final burial in South Carolina.
Concurrently, a special primary election filing period closes Tuesday to fill the vacant Senate seat, where Graham's sister, Darline Graham, was appointed by the state governor to temporarily hold the position.
