Under HUGE pressure from President Biden, other Western leaders and media reports…
House GOP Speaker Johnson haas decided to get ahead of Democrats FORCING a House vote that could peel off embracing House GOP voting support….
Johnson has advised he’ll advance HIS bill that he hops will garner Democratic and Republican member support for Ukraine Aid
Not what Donald Trump wants ……
He’s is against ANY help for the Ukraine….
And?
I’d bet it will NOT be a loan-lease deal….
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) told Republican senators Wednesday to expect the House to send them legislation to help Ukraine, but cautioned that what comes out of the House will look substantially different than the $95 billion foreign aid package the Senate passed last month.
Johnson tried to reassure frustrated GOP senators who asked him about funding for Ukraine during a question-and-answer session at the annual Senate Republican retreat, which was held at the Library of Congress.
Johnson told senators that the House will send a Ukraine aid package to the Senate but floated the idea of making it a loan or lend-lease program so U.S. taxpayers would not be shelling out tens of billions of dollars without any expectation of getting a return, according to senators who participated in the discussion.
The Speaker also talked about including something similar to the REPO for Ukrainians Act, sponsored by Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), which would authorize the confiscation of Russian sovereign assets and deposit the proceeds of liquidated property into a Ukraine support fund, senators said.
Notably, Johnson did not say whether such an Ukraine aid package would include tough border security reforms, such as “Remain in Mexico” language, which would face opposition from Senate Democrats.
Johnson gave Republican senators a pathway for helping Ukraine a day after he came under pressure from Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) to bring the Senate-passed package funding Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan to the House floor….
McConnell….
Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) on Thursday again pressed Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) to take up the Senate-passed national security spending package, which includes $60 billion for Ukraine, despite Johnson’s message to GOP senators this week that he’s moving in a different direction.
McConnell didn’t express much interest in waiting weeks or maybe months for the House to come up with an alternative proposal to help Ukraine.
“The chilling reality here is abundantly clear. Withholding critical weapons has not helped manage [Russian President Vladimir] Putin’s escalation. It has only emboldened him,” McConnell warned on the Senate floor…..
Democrats….
Speaker Mike Johnson told POLITICO that he expects to pass a future Ukraine assistance bill with Democratic votes, an acknowledgment of the persistent resistance to any new aid within the GOP.
Johnson said in a Thursday interview at the House Republican retreat that aid to both Ukraine and Israel could come up as one or even two separate bills. He said he anticipates it would happen using the House’s suspension calendar, which he’s used often in recent days to overcome pushback from his own party.
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The speaker’s remarks are the most definitive he has made so far on his plans for tens of billions of dollars in foreign aid that has languished in Congress for many weeks, even after the Senate cleared its own bipartisan package last month. They represent the clearest move Johnson has made to commit to a floor vote on Ukraine aid, despite significant disinterest in his own party in any new funding for Kyiv’s efforts against Russia….
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He’ll certainly need to consult with Democrats to have any hope of passing foreign aid on the suspensions calendar, which GOP leaders have used for multiple high-stakes bills that would otherwise have failed to get the near-unanimous Republican support needed to pass along party lines. A spokesperson for House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries did not immediately return a request for comment on the speaker’s remarks…..