Senate ready to punt Ukraine-border bill talks to next year

News

By Josh Christenson

The Senate appeared set Monday to push negotiations over a $110 billion supplemental spending bill on aid for Ukraine, Israel, Taiwan and US border security into 2024, with some Republicans saying it would be impossible for legislative text to be finalized before the holidays.

“Although Senate leadership has yet to acknowledge it, the negotiators themselves say writing and voting on a bill before we are scheduled to return the week of January 8 is simply not possible,” Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) told The Post in a statement.

“I’m happy to let the negotiations continue while in recess, and then have an opportunity to fully review, debate, and amend what they produce.”

Hours later, Senate Minority Whip John Thune (R-SD) told CNN that there was “no way” a vote would take place this week.

On Sunday, Johnson and 14 Senate Republicans sent a letter to Conference Chairman John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) to request a meeting when the upper chamber returns in January to discuss the efforts.

“Rushed and secret negotiations with Democrats who want an open border and who caused the current crisis will not secure the border,” they wrote, demanding “an open and transparent process” beginning in the new year.

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), who did not join his colleagues on the letter, told The Post on Monday that President Biden and his administration were “slow-walking” the negotiating process.

Biden, 81, tied the Ukraine and border funding requests to each other in October — along with the other aid proposals for Israel and Taiwan — and has demanded Congress pass the measure before its break or else hand Russian President Vladimir Putin “the greatest Christmas gift they could possibly give him.”

But congressional Republicans have balked at providing the funding without substantive reforms to US asylum policies or appropriate safeguards for Ukraine aid.

Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.), the lead Republican negotiator on the bill, worked through the weekend on several aspects of the asylum proposals but had yet to announce a deal by Monday afternoon.

“We’re pushing and saying, ‘If it’s not more obvious now that we’ve had two-and-a-half million people that have crossed the border illegally in the last year, and we’re now up to 10,000 people a day that are crossing the border — if it’s not obvious now this is a need, when would it be obvious?” Lankford told The Post last week when asked about the talks.

“The effects of years of failed border enforcement are compounded, border security policy is complex and our colleagues at the negotiating table are clear-eyed about the fact that getting this agreement right and producing legislative text is going to require some time,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), a proponent of additional aid to Ukraine, said in his floor remarks Monday.

“I’m encouraged by our colleagues’ commitment to keep making steady progress in their negotiations over the coming week and beyond.”

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) also thanked the negotiators — who also include Sens. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) and Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.) — for the extra hours they put in.

“Finding a middle ground is exceptionally hard, and both sides must accept they will have to make concessions and it’s going to take some more time to get it done,” Schumer said.

Murphy acknowledged a framework would have to be provided by the end of Monday in order for a vote to occur later this week, according to remarks reported by Punchbowl News.

Schumer in his floor speech only committed to confirming “before the end of the week” a slate of military nominations which had been held up for months by Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) in protest of a Pentagon policy that reimburses service members who travel across state lines to undergo abortion procedures.

The White House previously warned that Ukrainian military assistance was in danger of running out by the end of 2023, before a visit to Capitol Hill by Kyiv President Volodymyr Zelensky revealed the deadline was still months away.

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) criticized the Biden administration’s lack of transparency about the Ukraine aid following his own meeting with Zelensky, and has already sent the lower chamber into recess until Jan. 9.

“What the Biden Administration seems to be asking for is billions of additional dollars with no appropriate oversight, no clear strategy to win, and none of the answers that I think the American people are owed,” he told reporters at the time.

When the House does return to Washington, lawmakers will have a little more than a week to finalize the national security bill and pass it in both chambers before taking up further appropriations measures to avoid a partial government shutdown.