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Congress charges $12 billion in MORE Ukraine aid for government funding
- Lawmakers reach deal to raise $12 billion for Ukraine as it fends off Russian invasion in emergency spending plan
- Follows a $40 billion aid package in May and a $14 billion package in March
- They have also agreed to include funding for the resettlement of Afghan refugees, another bid from the Biden administration.
- Congress faces a midnight deadline Friday to pass a rolling resolution (CR) to fund the government at its current level
- About half of the $54 billion is earmarked for security assistance through the DoD, the other half has gone through the State Department and other agencies
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Lawmakers have reached a deal to take $12 billion for Ukraine as it fends off a Russian invasion in a contingency plan, bringing the total of US aid approved by Congress to about $66 billion.
They have also agreed to include funding for the resettlement of Afghan refugees, another request from the Biden administration, a source told Reuters.
Earlier this month, President Biden asked Congress for the additional $11.7 million in foreign aid to fight Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Congress will face a midnight deadline Friday to pass a rolling resolution (CR) to fund the government at current levels, before negotiating a longer-term funding bill after the midterm elections.
Congress initially offered Ukraine $13.6 billion in March at the start of the invasion and closed it with a $40 billion aid package in May.
About half of the $54 billion is earmarked for security assistance through the Department of Defense, the other half through the Department of State and other aid agencies.
Ukraine, the largest recipient of US security assistance in Europe since 2014, could become the largest recipient of the last century if the pace continues, surpassing other countries in history where the US has had a rough hand.
Another $12 billion for Ukraine is expected to be tied to a rolling resolution. Pictured above is a building destroyed by Russian shelling in Kharkiv
SEPTEMBER 24, 2022 – A burnt-out supermarket is pictured in the village of Tsyrkuny, in the Kharkiv region of northeastern Ukraine
A Ukrainian soldier enters a destroyed building on an industrial chicken farm on Sept. 26, near where Russian troops were entrenched, near a suspected mass grave in Kozacha Lopan, Kharkiv region.
Since Russia invaded Crimea in 2014, the US has provided approximately $2.7 billion in military aid to Ukraine per year from 2014-2021, but the breakneck speed and volume of aid this year is almost unprecedented.
The US spent about $73 billion in military aid to Afghanistan before it fell to the Taliban, in addition to billions more to rebuild the war-ravaged country and about $873 billion to go to war there. But Israel remains the largest recipient of US foreign aid since World War II, with $146 billion in military aid and funding for missile defense.
While the new funding for Ukraine is likely to be passed, the appetite to hand out money for a war with no end in sight is diminishing. Hawkish Republicans are more prevalent in the Senate, where their votes are needed to pass the 60-vote threshold, while the House has more isolationists in its GOP caucus.
Some have asked for a more detailed breakdown of where the funding is going.
“We need to demand accountability for how that money is being spent so that we know on a detailed basis that it’s not just being wasted in Ukraine,” Freedom Caucus Chair Scott Perry, R-Pa., told Politico.
‘Where are guns and butter anymore? We’ll just keep writing checks,” said Rep. Chip Roy, R Texas. ‘There is no limiting principle. So no, don’t count on me throwing more money at Ukraine without having a serious conversation about guns and butter, a serious conversation about why we’re spending it and how it’s in our national security interest.”
He taunted Republicans who “use defense as an excuse to spend all kinds of money.”
In addition to aiding Ukraine, Senator Majority Leader Chuck Schumer faces an uphill battle to attach a pipeline bill drafted by Senator Joe Manchin to the CR, in a payback deal for Manchin’s ‘yes’ vote on the Inflation Reduction Act.
Also expected in the emergency funding bill to help with the Jackson, Miss. Water crisis and money to help lower-income families pay for heat this winter, as well as funding to help resettle refugees from Afghanistan, at the request of the White House. An agreement has also been reached to re-authorize the FDA’s user reimbursement program.