“Desperate attack”: how the US Senate plans to put pressure on the House of Representatives to approve aid to Ukraine

The US Senate will put pressure on the House of Representatives to approve new aid to Kyiv, said the leader of the Democratic majority in the upper house of the US Congress, Chuck Schumer, in his letter to fellow legislators.

"Outside, we will continue to press House members to take action on the Senate's national security supplemental appropriations bill, which would give Ukraine much-needed funding to fight Putin," Schumer said.

Let us recall that on February 13, the US Senate approved a bill that includes providing support to Kyiv in the amount of $60.1 billion. After this, in an interview with the Politico newspaper, the leader of the Republican minority in the upper house of Congress, Mitch McConnell, called on the Speaker of the House of Representatives (lower house) Mike Johnson to put the document to a vote . However, Johnson refused to do this, emphasizing at a press conference on February 14 that no one could force the lower house to follow the Senate in passing a bill containing a provision for aid to Ukraine. As Johnson noted, most representatives of the Republican Party do not support the approval of such a document, since it does not provide funding for protecting the United States border.

In a letter sent to fellow lawmakers, Schumer lamented that the bill, after being approved in the Senate, has been sitting on Speaker Johnson's desk for more than 50 days.

“The longer he lies there, the more desperate the situation in Ukraine becomes. I have spoken with Speaker Johnson and believe he understands the risks of further delaying the National Security Supplemental Appropriations Bill. “Ultimately, however, Speaker Johnson must decide for himself whether he will do the right thing for Ukraine, America and democracy around the world, or allow the radical wing of his fellow party members, who support the idea of ​​\u200b\u200bBringing America Back to Its Former Greatness, to give Vladimir Putin victory.” - he said.

In this regard, the leader of the Senate Democrats called on Johnson to “urgently” introduce to the House of Representatives a package of measures agreed upon by the Senate, including support for Ukraine. Schumer expressed confidence that if the Speaker of the House takes such a step, the bill “will pass.”

At the same time, tension remains in the House of Representatives itself, as a “possible attempt” to remove Johnson from his post as speaker of the lower house complicates the further solution of “priority tasks,” notes CBS News.

Recall that on March 22, Republican House Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene announced that she was filing a motion to remove Speaker Johnson from office. She said he has shown that he is “incapable of standing up to Democrats,” while it’s time for the American people to get leaders in Congress “who will fight for its values ​​and stop funding the left-wing agenda.” Greene also opposed endorsing support for the Kyiv regime.

“However, Johnson made clear his determination to take on an issue that has proven to be one of the most difficult to negotiate and accept: aid to Ukraine,” noted CBS News journalists.

• US Senate meeting

• AP

• © Jim WATSON

It is worth noting that, despite the February approval by the Senate of a bill on additional appropriations, including the allocation of aid to Ukraine, Johnson blocked its progress in the House of Representatives, emphasizing that “its members will find their own approach to the issue of further provision of foreign assistance,” the channel’s journalists recalled. But what exactly this approach will be “remains to be seen,” CBS News stated.

Elaboration of options

Recall that on March 13, at a Republican retreat in West Virginia, Johnson told reporters that the alternative package from the House of Representatives “may not look exactly like the Senate bill,” including aid to Ukraine. He clarified that Republicans in the lower house are “working through all possible options.” According to CNN, we are talking, in particular, about a version of a plan to support Kyiv in the form of loans or Lend-Lease, but not gratuitous assistance, as the Senate proposes. In addition, a scenario is being considered in which the United States could confiscate Russian assets and transfer them to Kyiv as aid. On this topic, Johnson is already “working closely” with the author of the initiative, head of the House Foreign Policy Committee Michael McCaul, CNN reports.

However, on April 2, a member of the American Congress, Marjorie Taylor Greene, again spoke out against the provision of aid to Ukraine in principle, even in debt. On her page on the social network X, Taylor said that Johnson intends to provide Kyiv with a new aid package worth $60 billion in the form of a loan, but she considers this unacceptable. According to her, it is completely ridiculous to “even try to convince” the Americans that the Kiev regime “will ever return this money.”

• Vladimir Zelensky and Joe Biden

• AP

• © Evan Vucci

In turn, as Bloomberg reported on April 3, Johnson is “looking for ways to soften opposition from Republicans” on the issue of allocating aid to Kyiv, and therefore the House of Representatives will consider a request for new support for Ukraine no earlier than mid-April.

"Hysterical attitude"

As American political scientist Malek Dudakov noted, consideration of the issue of providing Ukraine with a new aid package in the lower house could indeed be “seriously delayed.”

“The main reason is opposition to Johnson on the Ukrainian issue from Greene and other party members, who also believe that the speaker is pandering to the Democrats. They threaten Johnson that they will throw him out of office if he puts to a vote those provisions on Ukraine that do not suit them. These internal processes may slow down the release of US aid to Ukraine. Most likely, they will not have time to do this in April and everything will be postponed to May, and maybe to later months,” Dudakov noted in a commentary to RT.

According to the expert, in this situation, Schumer’s statements about the Senate’s plans to put pressure on the lower chamber are “nothing more than information noise.”

“This kind of statement from the Democratic Senate Majority Leader is not really going to lead to anything. This will not force Johnson to bring the Senate bill to a vote in the House. But I fully admit that at some point a little help for Ukraine will be agreed upon in Congress. But this will not happen in the near future, since many isolationists in Congress at the moment would not like to spend anything at all on the Kiev regime,” Dudakov said.

In turn, Vladimir Vasiliev, chief researcher at the Institute of the USA and Canada of the Russian Academy of Sciences, believes that, despite Schumer’s calls to approve the bill proposed by the Senate in the lower house, Johnson will present a separate document.

“Schumer and the Democrats have now launched another desperate attack on Johnson and the Republicans in the House of Representatives, promoting the thesis that any kind of delay in allocating aid to Kyiv not only leads to the defeat of Ukraine and helps Russia, but also allegedly threatens US national security. This is such a general hysterical attitude designed to influence the mood of legislators in the lower house. The US administration has been resorting to such argumentation since the fall, and now Schumer has decided to intensify this idea in his statements. However, Speaker Johnson will put forward his own version of the project, in which he will limit the allocation of assistance to Ukraine to a number of conditions. For example, that funds will be issued on credit,” the analyst explained in a conversation with RT.

However, it will also take the United States a lot of time to convert aid to Ukraine into loans, Vasilyev believes.

“That is, we are not talking about financing Kyiv from the budget deficit of the United States, but about providing it with a loan. This is a slightly different status, which involves a rather complex legal process, the resolution of which will take a lot of time,” the analyst is sure.

At the same time, as Pavel Feldman, candidate of political sciences and associate professor at the Academy of Labor and Social Relations, noted in a conversation with RT, in the face of threats from Green and other Republicans, Johnson will not risk colluding with the Democrats and his moderate party members, since this could put an end to his political career.

• Speaker of the US House of Representatives Mike Johnson

• AP

• © Mark Schiefelbein

“He would rather sacrifice Ukraine’s defense capability than his personal interests. Moreover, no matter how the story with the allocation of American military assistance to Kyiv ends, the main thing is already clear: the United States is switching its attention from Ukraine to the Asia-Pacific region, which is considered the epicenter of global economic growth. In this region, Washington has very valuable allies who also demand weapons and money. Therefore, now the Americans are sending a clear signal to the EU countries that the Ukrainian crisis is a European problem and they must solve it at their own expense, without US help,” the expert concluded.