WASHINGTON — After voting to avert a government shutdown Friday, the House left town for its two-week Easter recess without passing critical military aid for Ukraine as the war-torn nation runs dangerously low on ammunition in its fight against the Russian invasion.
Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., said he wanted to finish funding the government before shifting his attention to foreign aid for a trio of U.S. allies: Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan. And he has rebuffed calls from other leaders to put the $95 billion Senate-passed aid package on the House floor, saying he is drafting his own Ukraine package.
But it means that the lower chamber won’t address funding for Kyiv until mid-April — at the earliest. And Johnson has given few hints as to how he might construct his supplemental aid package, though he maintains it is a priority.
“There’s a number of avenues that we’ve been looking at to address that,” Johnson told reporters this week, adding that funding the U.S. government needed to come first. “And having done that now, we’ll turn our attention to it and we won’t delay.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said his country can’t afford any further delays. He’s told congressional leaders that, without additional aid from the U.S., Ukraine could lose its two-year war against Russia. On Friday, U.S. officials condemned Russia’s “brutal” overnight attack on Ukrainian cities and civilian targets, described as the “largest series of air strikes Russia has launched against Ukraine’s energy grid since the start of this war.”
For months, the debate over sending Ukraine a fresh round of aid has vexed the divided government in Washington. President Joe Biden, along with the two Senate leaders — Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. — have been exerting pressure on Johnson to quickly take up the Senate bill that includes $60 billion for Ukraine.
But five months on the job, Johnson has had to tread…
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