WASHINGTON — With nine months left until the presidential elections, Donald Trump’s influence is already noticeable, the former president proposes suspending any future US aid to Ukraine.
The cold water fell minutes after the text, the result of several months of negotiations in the Senate, became public.
The bill provides $60 billion for Ukraine and $14 billion for Israel. It also contains a reform of the US immigration system, a hot topic in the electoral campaign, to which 20 billion are allocated.
Republicans have been calling for months for a stronger policy in response to the arrival of large numbers of migrants, many of them Latin Americans, at the border with Mexico.
But they say the text does not go far enough. Mike Johnson, leader of the House of Representatives, considers him “dead.”
“Horrible”
It doesn’t matter that Democrats insist that it is the “toughest” text on immigration policy in decades or that it has the support of Democratic President Joe Biden, candidate for a second term.
In these negotiations, the last word goes to his predecessor and probable rival in November.
Without the support of Republicans in the House, the text will come to nothing. To be adopted, this important bill must be approved by both houses of Congress.
Democrats have a majority in the Senate, but Republicans control the Lower House.
In the two years since the outbreak of war, Congress has disbursed more than $110 billion. Now many Republicans want to turn off the tap, they ask for accounts and strategies for how the war would be won.
On Monday morning, Trump stood his ground, saying that “only an idiot, or a radical left-wing Democrat, would vote for this horrible border bill that only gives closure authority after 5,000 interceptions a day when we already have the right to CLOSE THE BORDER NOW, what must be done,” he estimated on his Truth Social network.
“Don’t be STUPID!!! We need an independent bill on borders and immigration,” Trump says in his message, in which he asks that it not be linked “to foreign aid in any way.”
Frontera
On immigration issues, Trump leads his possible electoral rival Joe Biden in the polls.
“We don’t have enough (border) agents. We don’t have enough (immigration) judges. We need help. Why won’t you help me?” he asked Monday, referring to Republicans.
The heated debate over the border diverts attention from Ukraine even though the future of American aid to the country is at stake.
The text presented on Sunday is one of the few that can obtain the support of both parties.
That is why the possibility of acting before November seems small, if not non-existent.
Since the beginning of the war, the Kremlin has been betting on a decrease in aid from the West, and any hesitation from kyiv’s allies reinforces its idea that it will win.
The United States is by far Ukraine’s main military supporter. It released its last tranche of military aid in late December.
They have been fighting for several months to disburse new funds, demanded by President Joe Biden and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky.
Zelensky’s last two visits to Washington, in September and December 2023, were unsuccessful.
Source: With information from AFP
