President Joe Biden on Tuesday slammed House and Senate Republicans for appearing to do the bidding of the Russian government by blocking a supplemental appropriations bill that would allocate billions of dollars towards Ukraine’s defence against Moscow.
Speaking alongside Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky during a press conference at the White House, Mr Biden said the US is “rapidly coming to an end of our ability to help Ukraine” without passage of the supplemental spending bill he has asked for but thus far not received.
He also said Russian President Vladimir Putin is “banking” on the US Congress not being able to agree to advance the funding bill, and cautioned that the American government “must prove him wrong”.
“It's stunning that we've gotten to this point,” the president said, adding that it must be fully appreciated how the Republican-led House and the Senate Republican Conference’s refusal to approve defence aid to Kyiv without enacting draconian changes to US immigration law is being seen overseas — and particularly in Russia, where Putin-aligned propagandists have openly praised the GOP for blocking further aid to Mr Zelensky’s government.
“Moscow celebrated when Republicans voted to block Ukraine aid last week — a host of a Kremlin run shows literally said and I quote: ‘Well done Republicans, that's good for us,’” Mr Biden recalled, apparently referring to a recent Daily Beast report detailing the gleeful reaction to the GOP’s intransigence on Russian state television.
The president added: “If you're being celebrated by Russian propagandists, it might be time to rethink what you're doing”.
The president’s condemnation of Republicans’ refusal to back the supplemental aid package he has requested to help bolster defence operations for Kyiv’s fight against Moscow as well as Israel’s ongoing war with Hamas comes as negotiations between House and Senate Republicans and Senate Democrats have been at an impasse over the GOP’s demand that Mr Biden agree to draconian changes to US immigration policies meant to make it more difficult — if not impossible — for largely non-white immigrants from South and Central America and other countries to claim asylum at the US-Mexico border or receive protection from removal from the country.
The GOP hostage-taking, which is reminiscent of other Republican-induced crises over funding for the US government and the federal debt ceiling, has held up funding for multiple US defence priorities in recent weeks.
Additionally, some Republicans in both chambers remain intractably opposed to appropriating further defence aid to Kyiv because it would be seen by their political base as a win for Mr Biden, and because many GOP voters believe conspiracy theories espoused by former president Donald Trump and his allies, who claim that Mr Biden’s steadfast support for Ukraine stems from alleged bribes paid to him through his son, Hunter Biden.
There is no evidence to support any such claims of corruption, but some GOP members have cited the outlandish theories to justify their lack of support for further aid to Kyiv.
Nonetheless, Mr Biden said his administration is currently “working with Senate Democrats and Republicans to try to find a bipartisan compromise both in terms of changes in policy and provide the resources we need to secure the border” and stressed that he is “ready” to do so and has already offered to compromise in order to move the supplemental finding bill forward.
“Holding Ukraine funding hostage in an attempt to force through an extreme Republican partisan agenda on the border is not how it works. We need real solutions,” he said before warning of what he described as the extremely high stakes in play as Congress considers whether and how to fund more defence aid to Kyiv.
“History will judge harshly those who turn their back on freedoms cause today Ukraine's freedom is on the line. But if we don't stop Putin, will endanger the freedom of everyone almost everywhere,” he said.
“Putin will keep going and would-be aggressors everywhere will be emboldened to try to take what they can by force,” he continued before turning to Mr Zelensky and pledging that neither he nor the American people would “walk away” from his country in its hour of need.
