GOP midterm gains could slow foreign efforts

Would hinder Biden’s work on Ukraine, Iran

WASHINGTON — A Republican takeover of the House or Senate in the midterm elections next week could complicate the Biden administration’s efforts to defend Ukraine, slow the confirmation of key US ambassadors and lead to public interrogations of officials who were involved in the US withdrawal from Afghanistan last year.

Congress has more leverage over domestic affairs than over foreign policy, thanks to the president’s broad powers as commander in chief. But Democrats are bracing for a far more complicated — and, they fear, more politicized — national security environment if Republicans control legislative calendars, committee chairmanships and spending power.

Most worrisome for the Biden administration is the prospect that Republicans might slow the torrent of money and weapons to Ukraine that began before Russia invaded in February. Representative Kevin McCarthy, a California Republican and the minority leader, said last month that a Republican-led House would be unwilling to approve “blank check” assistance for Ukraine.

Congress has approved $60 billion in aid for Ukraine since the war began, with no explicit conditions. But some Republicans, encouraged by prominent conservatives such as Fox News host Tucker Carlson, are increasingly questioning the price tag of US aid to the country.

Many conservatives, however, doubt that McCarthy’s comment and those of some Republican candidates mean that a Republican-led House would constrain US support.

Danielle Pletka, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and a former Republican Senate foreign policy staff member, called McCarthy’s remark “a completely empty, pandering statement” and said she was not worried about the party’s commitment to defending Ukraine.

“I think that was just a toe in the water of this growing divide inside the Republican Party between the traditionalist, internationalist wing and the populist, Orban wing of the party,” said Pletka, referring to Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, a strongman who has become a hero to many conservative supporters of former President Donald Trump's.

The Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, implicitly rebuked McCarthy by saying last month that the United States should do even more to support Kyiv. But several Republican Senate champions of Ukraine are retiring at the end of this Congress: Rob Portman of Ohio, Richard Burr of North Carolina, and Ben Sasse of Nebraska.

One possible scenario would be a new Republican emphasis on oversight to ensure that US weapons and aid are not diverted from their intended use, in a country with a history of deep corruption. That note was sounded in June by the two Republicans in line to become chairs of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs and the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations.

US aid to Ukraine “will neither be effective nor politically sustainable without strong oversight and accountability mechanisms,” wrote Representative Mike McCaul, a Texas Republican, and Senator Jim Risch, an Idaho Republican. Both men say they continue to support assisting Ukraine.

McCaul and Risch have been sharply critical of the Biden administration’s withdrawal from Afghanistan. Both would probably summon Biden officials, including Secretary of State Antony Blinken, to public hearings.

McCaul wrote to Blinken in mid-October requesting that the State Department preserve all documents and communications that might “be potentially responsive to a future congressional inquiry, request, investigation, or subpoena.”

In an August statement on the anniversary of the fall of Kabul, Risch complained that “we still don’t have full answers as to how the Biden administration failed to see it coming and did not have an effective plan in place to evacuate American citizens and Afghan partners.”

“They are going to drag the Biden administration over the coals over Afghanistan,” Pletka said.

Several Republicans called for Blinken’s resignation after the Kabul evacuation, and two House Republicans introduced a resolution calling for his impeachment. But Republicans say they do not expect such efforts to gain traction.

McCaul takes a particular interest in China and has expressed impatience with the pace of delivery of US arms purchased by Taiwan for its defense against a potential Chinese invasion. He has also said he would insist on further tightening export controls to deprive China of critical American technology it might use for military purposes.

McCaul led a House Republican task force on China that issued a report in 2020 calling for actions including increased military spending, new sanctions to punish Chinese human rights violations, and more aggressive measures to counter Chinese propaganda.

Republicans in both chambers are eager to press the Biden administration over its policy toward Iran. Many Republicans have criticized President Biden for not doing more to support protesters who have been demonstrating for weeks against the country’s clerical regime. “Republicans are going to put Iran back on the front burner in Washington,” said Mark Dubowitz, CEO of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a hawkish think tank that calls for relentless pressure on the Iranian government.

“Republicans are going to be introducing sanctions bill after bill,” he said.

Republican gains in Congress would also further complicate Biden’s efforts to resurrect the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, which Trump abandoned.

International talks to restore the deal have been stalled for weeks, and Biden officials express doubt that Tehran is willing to scale back its nuclear program again for sanctions relief.

A Republican Senate could also further slow the confirmation of Biden’s nominees to national security positions throughout the government. In particular, the administration is still waiting for the Senate to confirm more than three dozen ambassadorial nominees, as well as other picks for mid- and high-level State Department posts. They include ambassadors to Russia, Saudi Arabia, Brazil, India, Nigeria, and the United Arab Emirates.

Senate Democrats hope to confirm many of them before the end of the year. If they cannot, the nominations expire and the candidates must be nominated again at the start of the next Congress.