Funding for defense aid for Ukraine and Israel enjoys relatively wide bipartisan backing, but a growing number of Republicans have become skeptical on help for Kyiv, leaving its approval in doubt.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) has indicated he does not agree with the administration’s approach of combining Ukraine and Israel funding into a single bill. Even in the Senate, where Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has been a forceful advocate for aiding Ukraine, some Republican lawmakers have demanded additional spending on border security in exchange for their greenlighting more funding for Kyiv.
“The reality is these issues are all connected, and they are all urgent,” Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Patty Murray (D-Wash.) told fellow lawmakers. “Our adversaries are cheering for dysfunction. So let’s instead show them unity.”
The Republican vice chair of the committee, Sen. Susan Collins (Maine), said she also favored a single effort to help Israel and Ukraine.
“Some have argued for decoupling funding to address these threats, and focusing only on the Iranian-backed terrorists who massacred so many Israelis on October 7,” Collins said. “We must recognize that our national security interests are being aggressively challenged by all of these authoritarian actors in an effort to dismantle the international order that we established following World War II.”
Both Blinken and Austin have said that supporting Ukraine and Israel is crucial to advancing U.S. foreign policy interests, with Kyiv’s ability to fend off an expansionistic Kremlin at stake and Israel facing a major security threat from Hamas following the Oct. 7 cross-border attack.
U.S. adversaries “continue to do everything they can to disrupt us,” Blinken told the committee, in an opening statement that was repeatedly interrupted by protesters calling for a cease-fire and for the protection of civilians in Gaza.
“Many are again making the bet that the United States is too divided or distracted at home to stay the course,” Blinken said. “That’s what’s at stake with President Biden’s national security supplemental funding request.”
Austin echoed the concern that a failure to approve aid would lead to a less-stable world.
“In both Israel and Ukraine, democracies are fighting ruthless foes who are out to annihilate them. We will not let Hamas or Putin win,” Austin said. “Only firm American leadership can ensure that tyrants and thugs and terrorists worldwide are not emboldened to commit more aggression and more atrocities.”
U.S. policymakers are hoping to avoid a regional war in the Mideast, in part by sending sufficient aid to Israel such that rivals — chiefly Iran — are deterred from attempting additional attacks on the country. The amount that the White House requested for Israel, $14 billion, is more than four times what the United States sent the country last year.
Ukraine’s friends and rivals in Europe have been closely watching the turmoil in Congress in recent weeks, as House Republicans deposed their speaker and then struggled to pick another one. Democrats hope to pass security assistance quickly before currents funding for Ukraine dry up, potentially within weeks.
