US Senate okays $60B Ukraine aid bill but hurdles in House remain
THE U.S. Senate approved $60 billion in funding for Ukraine yesterday, but the Republican-led House Speaker indicated his chamber will reject the bill.
The $95 billion package includes funding for Israel’s military and key strategic ally Taiwan, but the lion’s share would help Ukraine restock depleted ammunition supplies, weapons and other crucial needs as it enters a third year of war.
The bill, which the Senate voted early yesterday morning and which passed with bipartisan support, does not include changes to U.S. immigration policy.
A previous Senate text that encompassed both the border and foreign aid was blocked by members of Johnson’s own party in the upper chamber after he similarly vowed to kill it in the House over concerns it did not sufficiently address illegal border crossings.
“House Republicans were crystal clear from the very beginning of discussions that any so-called national security supplemental legislation must recognize that national security begins at our own border,” Johnson said in a statement.
Johnson had previously stated that the Senate’s first bill – which included some of the harshest immigration curbs in decades but which he said still did not go far enough – would be “dead on arrival” in his chamber.
His rhetoric matched that of former president Donald Trump, who has forcefully called for the bill to be rejected as he runs for office again and seeks to exploit Joe Biden’s perceived weakness on immigration.
Despite months of bipartisan negotiations over the bill, Senate Republicans ultimately voted to block it from proceeding.
The bill that passed in the Senate yesterday excluded those immigration reforms, and passed by 70 votes for to 29 against, with several Republicans backing it.
“The Senate did the right thing last week by rejecting the UkraineTaiwan-Gaza-Israel-Immigration legislation due to its insufficient border provisions, and it should have gone back to the drawing board to amend the current bill to include real border security provisions,” Johnson said.
“Now, in the absence of having received any single border policy change from the Senate, the House will have to continue to work its own will on these important matters.”
The Republican logjam over the bill comes amid both disunity within the party and an apparent desire among some to keep the border an open issue leading into the election.
Johnson’s opposition to the Ukraine funding bill also places him out of step with the top Republican in the Senate, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.