President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has long pleaded; if the country does not get new support from the US, Putin will win and move forward through Europe.
After protracted negotiations, the US Senate has now finally presented a bill on support for Kiev. It is about a total of 60 billion dollars.
Ex-president Donald Trump and his party colleagues, however, declare the writing dead – even before it was put to a vote.
“I’ve seen enough. The bill is worse than expected,” tweets the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Republican Mike Johnson.
The move came just hours after a bipartisan group of senators introduced a bill totaling $118 billion.
Crucial for Republicans
In addition to the hotly debated aid to Ukraine of roughly $60 billion, it also includes $14 billion to Israel, humanitarian aid to Gaza, aid to war refugees, and money to strengthen the US’s southern border.
The latter is critical to congressional Republicans, who often argue that the United States must deal with the influx of migrants at the Mexican border before helping other countries.
But even though both Republicans and Democrats are behind the 370-page bill, it gets the thumbs down from tone-setting Republicans like Mike Johnson and Donald Trump.
Trump clear
The former president called the settlement “terrible” and “a disaster”, even before it was completed. Now he is urging his Republican party colleagues to reject the proposal.
“Don’t be STUPID!!! We need a separate package for border control and immigration. It should in no way be tied to foreign support,” Trump writes on his social network Truth.
A first vote in the Democrat-controlled Senate is scheduled for “before Wednesday.” It only involves suspending the debate on the text and presenting it to the full chamber. Whether the 60 yes votes required for this will be reached is unclear. There are 49 Republicans in the Senate and 51 members who vote with the Democrats.
If the bill still passes in the Senate, the House of Representatives will have its say. There, the Republicans, with Speaker Mike Johnson in the lead, have the majority with 219 of the 435 seats (three are vacant).