Congress Set for Heated Battle Following Recess as Biden Wants 'North of $10 Billion' Sent to Ukraine
A new report says that the Biden administration will be seeking an additional $10 billion in aid for Ukraine.
The report from Punchbowl News, which was based on sources it did not name, said the request could be made as soon as this week, even though Congress is on recess.
The report said the exact size of the new aid package was not defined, but cited a source it did not name as saying the ask would be “north of $10 billion.”
The site estimated that to date, spending approved through Congress has sent $110 billion to Ukraine and its allies.
As of July, the Council on Foreign Relations said that the U.S. had directly sent Ukraine $3.9 billion in humanitarian assistance, $26.4 billion in financial assistance, and $46.6 billion in military aid.
In June, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said he wanted to limit spending on Ukraine to that contained in a bill that suspends the debt ceiling and put limits on spending, according to The Washington Post.
“We will go through the appropriations process, and we will do the numbers that we just agreed to,” he said, according to Punchbowl News.
McCarthy has said what he calls efficiencies can be found in the Pentagon budget, and that anything sent to Ukraine should come from cutting Pentagon waste, according to the Post.
Former President Donald Trump has opposed aid to Ukraine, according to The Hill.
However, in the most recent Congressional tests of support for Ukraine, critics of aid lost.
Before leaving for recess, the Senate rejected a proposal to Republican Sen. Mike Lee of Utah to tie U.S. spending on Ukraine to that of NATO allies, according to Reuters. The proposed amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act was shot down 71-13.
Also last month, multiple House Republican-backed efforts to limit Ukraine’s aid lost, according to The Hill.
A proposal for Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida to wipe out all security assistance for Ukraine failed 358-70, with 149 fellow Republicans voting against Gaetz’s bill.
Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia proposed wiping out $300 million in aid in a bill that saw 130 Republicans vote against Greene in an overall 341-89 defeat of her proposal.
“Congress should not authorize another penny for Ukraine and push the Biden administration to pursue peace,” Greene said in introducing her proposal, according to Newsweek.
“Ukraine is not the 51st state of the United States of America,” she said.
The Hill noted some Republicans differed with Gaetz and Greene.
“We know this is a worldwide war that we’re in of authoritarians versus democracies; this is not a war we chose, war criminal [Russian President Vladimir] Putin is the person who started the war,” Republican Rep. Joe Wilson of South Carolina said.
Republican Rep. Victoria Spartz of Indiana, who was born in Ukraine, said Ukraine is the front line of the war for freedom.
“I disagree that Ukraine is not a national interest,” Spartz said. “Stopping this war and deterring aggressors like China and Russia, it is in our national interest.”
“Now we need to help Ukraine, and we need to understand that, you know, there are a lot of life are going to, you know, to be lost for Ukrainians, but we need to make sure that we don’t have never-ending war and better and faster security assistance will … help to restore peace,” she said.
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