After the administration missed one congressionally mandated deadline to implement new sanctions on specified Russian defense and intelligence entities, The Daily Beast reports Senators are keeping a close eye on the next due date:
Countries and businesses who have financial relationships with those Russian entities will face sanctions if they do business with them after Aug. 2—the date President Trump signed the law. In the meantime, those countries and businesses can prove that they are terminating or winding down their financial relationships with the Russian entities. By Jan. 29, the administration must solidify which countries and entities are continuing to do business with those Russian firms, and are therefore subject to additional sanctions.
President Trump has been reluctant to implement sanctions. Senators John McCain (R-AZ), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee and Ben Cardin (D-MD), ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, had little luck in getting the administration to answer for its actions last time around:
When lawmakers asked questions about the delay, they were left in the dark. It was only after Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) pressed Deputy Secretary of State John Sullivan directly late last month during a phone call that the State Department belatedly issued guidance on how it would implement the sanctions—26 days after it was due.
McCain and Cardin have threatened "further action" if the president continues to drag his feet on following the law, but the truth is that there is not much Congress can do to force Trump to act. It will have to get creative with the leverage it does hold over the executive branch.
“While we may not be able to directly enforce it, I understand that we have limits as to how we can enforce. Congress doesn’t have a military that’s under our command,” Cardin added. “The president does. But we have purse strings that are under our command. And we could use that. We have a lot of power that we can exercise.”
Congress Braces for Russia Sanctions Face-Off With White House as New Deadline Looms (Daily Beast)