With Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky back in Washington to pressure Congress and the Biden administration for more funding, House Republicans are preparing to make a stand against what they have characterized as a “blank check” to Kiev.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), an opponent of unconditional Ukraine aid, has in the past made comments about wanting to have accountability practices in place before more money is given to Kiev. However, in the present battle over some $61 billion in Ukraine aid being currently held up in Congress, Johnson’s condition for approving the legislation is for it to include funding for US border security efforts.
During a joint press conference with Zelensky on Tuesday, US President Joe Biden announced he had "just signed another $200 million drawdown" from the Pentagon for Ukraine.
Ed Martin, president of Phyllis Schlafly Eagles and chairperson of the Missouri Republican Party, told Radio Sputnik’s Fault Lines on Tuesday that Zelensky would “face stiff winds” in Washington as pro-war officials are more likely to prefer only funding Israel, a key ally, over both Israel and Ukraine.
“I wouldn’t put anything past what we often call ‘the uni-party,’” he cautioned.
12 December 2023, 19:01 GMT
“In a certain sense, you’ve got President Joe Biden and all of his influence and power as the head of the Executive Branch; you’ve got Chuck Schumer and Mitch McConnell both running the Senate together in some sense, and they’re in lock-step with Biden; and so the wall of defense for pouring more money into Ukraine without any transparency is the House. I just don’t know what to make of it. I think down to a one-person majority, maybe two, so it’s really tight and a lot of the Republicans that are in office for more than a term or two are not sort of ‘MAGA’ populists, they’re old-school Republicans and think this kind of spending is what we have to do.”
“I also think that the Nikki Haley exposure over the last week or two about how much money she made by being on Boeing’s board and all, there’s a lot of people that are in that same - you know, their family works in those companies, and that’s the dominant force.”
“So, I think Zelensky’s lost his shine, but I think the institutional forces are strong, so we’ll see what happens, but his presence to me is a sign of some desperation. I mean, he’s trying now to change the dynamic that is sliding away from him. And the truth is that, and I hate to be this crass, even the power brokers that want to get money off of this, they don’t want two wars, so they’re going to spend their money in Israel and in Gaza and pouring money into that war, that’s good enough, so I think Zelensky’s not the new guy in town right now and he’s going to face some stiff winds, But I wouldn’t bet against it honestly, I just think our leaders are stupid and they will throw money at stuff like this whenever they can.”
“What they’re doing now is for Republicans to have a way to tell their voters that ‘I didn’t give a blank check’ so there’ll be some sort of strings attached and transparency, which won’t be real, it won’t be significant,” he said.
“I think they’re underestimating the base in the Republican Party and I think Nikki Haley is showing - she is supposed to be on a boomlet in opposition to Trump - she’s losing ground,” he said, adding, “I hope that there will be some drama on this in the House that can change the dynamic, but really it’s a political fight now to give cover to some Republicans who want to give away the ranch.”