US House Speaker Mike Johnson indicated Monday that his Republican-led chamber would not take up a bill to provide billions in new assistance for Ukraine and others, despite its likely passage in the Senate with bipartisan backing.
The $95 billion package includes funding for Israel's fight against Hamas militants and for key strategic ally Taiwan, but the lion's share -- $60 billion -- would help pro-Western Ukraine restock depleted ammunition supplies, weapons and other crucial needs as it enters a third year of war.
The bill, which could see a final Senate vote in the early hours Tuesday morning, does not include changes to US immigration policy.
A previous Senate text that encompassed both the border and foreign aid was killed 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 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.
AFU Reportedly Destroys Multi-Million-Dollar Russian T-80 Tank With Bradley-Fired TOW Missile
Despite months of bipartisan negotiations over the bill, Senate Republicans ultimately voted to block it from proceeding.
Another bill excluding the immigration provisions however gained enough support from Republicans to move forward in the Democratic-controlled Senate, making it almost certain it will pass a final simple-majority vote around midweek.
- 'America First' -
"The Senate did the right thing last week by rejecting the Ukraine-Taiwan-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," he added.
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.
Before voting Sunday to move forward with the $95 billion package, McConnell urged his colleagues to reject the isolationist approach of Trump -- without naming him -- and his right-wing allies in the House, and to think about the message it would send if the United States failed to support Ukraine and other democracies.
"Our allies and partners are hoping that the indispensable nation -- the leader of the free world -- has the resolve to continue. And our adversaries are hoping for something quite different," he said.
Trump sparked consternation among NATO allies over the weekend with a campaign speech in which he said he would "encourage" Russia to invade countries who do not meet defense spending goals.
He renewed those complaints on Monday, claiming on his Truth Social network that "we are helping Ukraine for more than 100 Billion Dollars more than NATO," apparently referring to other allies besides the United States.
"NATO HAS TO EQUALIZE, AND NOW... IF NOT AMERICA FIRST!" he posted.
You can also highlight the text and press Ctrl + Enter
Comments (10)
Funny how you people think a president of USA should care more about Ukraine than his own country. Idiots!
MAGAZ - Christian values begin and END here
Moscow Mike Johnson, still doing everything he can to help russia. We all know they would just ‘move the goalposts’ if their demand were met. This has nothing to do with the southern border, and everything to do with the fact that MAGA is a russian controlled faction.
What use is there in defeating Russia or closing a physical border, if the spiritual border is open to the devil in our own souls and cultures? The rot from within will have the same effect! Defeating Russia to then give birth to millions of people that burn in Hell and to be one of the nations that becomes as fallen as in the days of Noah, and has the mark of the Beast and suffers God's wrath, is not a victory! Instead, as Jesus Christ said of Judas, it would be better if those people did not get born! It would be better if Ukraine and USA became nuclear waste lands! Truly!
Anything that severely harms the USA, such as our border issue, which is an issue of evil in our high places, also places a ticking death clock on our nation's ability to save Europe or anyone. So what if we save Ukraine now, but 10 years later we are so ruined inside that we cannot continue to be reliable anyway, and so the calamity would then only be merely pushed off a bit! But we know from the Bible what will happen. We know the nations will all become completely evil as in the days of Noah. The Beast, The Anti-Christ, The False Prophet, Gog and Magog, Armageddon, The Horsemen and Trumpets, The 2 Witnesses, Etc. What is coming is coming, sooner or later, and it is worse than anything there has ever been. And Ukraine and the USA will both be completely depraved as in the days of Noah, and almost every person born now in Ukraine and USA dies with no saving Biblical belief and relation to the real Lord Jesus. Billions are simply born to burn forever. The Bible is clear!
Millions of criminals, and some percent of actual terrorists from various enemy origins, flood into the United States continually. This is an increasingly severe danger to our communities and, when it hits a critical mass, soon, to the nation itself. Normally, this should be its own issue and its own bill! However, purely deliberate evil in the Democrat party insists on the treasonous open border so that they can use the invaders to gain power. These evil doers and Trump are 2 sides of the same coin, and the 2 parties have many evil common denominators, like 2 hands of the devil. Doing what is correct morally and for our own defense in Ukraine yet flooding our own boat with evil will simply remove the USA in the not to far future. It is already rotten in so many ways. And that means Europe will have no effective USA as a result, anyway!...
The us will have to be crazy to put a man like Trump. a criminal into office. I will not vote for a rapist. Why don't women speak up and vote for Biden. I was a Republican but after been a witness to this mess I am not. These representatives are acting like children at the expense of human lives.
@Lucy Price, Who is Biden! Oh that one, but Biden is too busy walking into things , bumping his head. Biden should have retired years ago. Demorats 🦌💩 . Its from being democratic that your town and citys turned into a immigrant shithole. And being polital correct with your stupid rainboes. Get bolls or a vagina kids. Theres no rainbows etc.
@Fuck off demorat, enjoying the fascist Kool-Aid are we?
@Lucy Price, If you read some of the comments on this on-line newspaper, you can see that the possibility of Trump winning the White House is there. The US, the country that was admired as the symbol of democracy and freedom, is now falling apart, unable to find "normal" candidates to run the country. Trump is a cracy scunbag, and Biden is too old and with too much experience. If Trump wins, the US will be isolated from the rest of the world and China will become the first superpower, and maybe send the US to hell, with the help of its most important ally, Russia, the country that Trump supports. It is impossible to be more stupid, illiterate and scunbag, but many Americans are now illiterate and unable to understand the most basic principles, voting Trump and believing the Earth is flat.
@Barruntaranchos, you sir are a stupid soviet dreamer orc . Putler is kaput. Be happy while your shithole russian towns is still standing.
@Shalom, I can´t undestand how a nation and people like Jewish, that has given de world so many brilliant brains, is so stupid as to think the only solution to their conflict with Muslims is to eliminate all of them. I don´t know the figures, but I guess there are at least 50 Muslims for every Jew in the world. It is IMPOSSIBLE to solve the problems between Israel and the Muslim world through war. The rest of the world, specially Europe, is paying the price and is fed up with Jewish. And the US is so stupid that have learned nothing from 11-S. Israel has everything to lose and nothing to win, and in the meantime is creating a huge problem for Ukraine and helping sycopath criminal Vladimir Putin to win.
Europe must step up to help Ukraine. USA has dropped out of the equation. UK, France, Germany, being the larger countries of Europe, you must step up and take leadership and assume the USA is backing Russia to win. Be brave and stalwart. Ukraine's cause is just.
Mike Johnson has no balls He needs to be voted out. I am ashamed of our representatives. Having a political football at Ukraine expense. I am repulsed at their behavior. I am a US citizen who wants to clean house in Washington. Why doesn't Biden do something.
Clowns. Kindergarden politicians. Get rid of Trump and Biden . Then have some candy apples. Israel and Ukraine will do their best with fixing the world of war criminals, terrs and snake shit. Thank them later.
@Go Europe, If you talk about world war criminals, first at all now is Netanyahu. He has killed in a few months more innocent civilians than sycopath criminal Vladimir Putin. Ukraine is fighting for freedom, Israel is making a genocide, giving at the same time the best help and support Putin could ever have dreamed.
@Barruntaranchos, The response of Israel has very serious problems that look like what Russia is doing. They really do have to defend against a culture of terrorists and people indoctrinated from birth to hate and kill jews, and religious teachings to kill them, and against enemy nations that again and again attacked them, but their form of response here has gone into terrible places, and of course they are an anti-christian nation just like their enemies are. Both the Israelis and the people called Palestinians will be at ground zero of Armageddon and will both be horrifically massacred in that time. And we also know Israel saw that massacre coming, had the plans to it, watched the enemy physically prepare, etc., and yet it happened..... I mean, something really really odd about that.... But Israel will get what the Bible says, and so will anyone living there. Those "Palestinians" are pawns, raised in hate, made use of by nations as Islam, and they will have far worse done to them, just as Israel will only be saved at its very end by the return of Messiah Jesus, the same Jesus who is the Lord in the Old Testament and who sends all who reject Him into eternal damnation.
@aa, Anti-Christian? That's absurd. In fact, Israel, although the haredi rabbis have too much say, is quite pluralistic. About the only thing it rejects is Arab terrorism funded by Iran.
@aa, If you treat people (Palestinians) as if they were wild beasts, the consequence is the terror we saw from Hamas. Netanyahu creates terrorism acting worse than terrorists.