Current:Home > MarketsHouse Speaker Johnson is insisting on sweeping border security changes in a deal for Ukraine aid -SecurePath Capital
House Speaker Johnson is insisting on sweeping border security changes in a deal for Ukraine aid
View
Date:2025-04-16 10:44:42
WASHINGTON (AP) — House Speaker Mike Johnson told fellow Republicans on Tuesday that sweeping changes to U.S. border policy would be their “hill to die on” in negotiations over President Joe Biden’s nearly $106 billion package for the wars in Ukraine and Israel and other security needs.
Johnson delivered the hard-line message Tuesday morning before Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s video address to senators, a classified briefing that the Biden administration organized to underscore how desperately the aid is needed. Biden is pushing a reluctant Congress to approve the military, economic and humanitarian aid package, but the injection of border security into the negotiations has made progress difficult.
“The battle is for the border,” Johnson said at a news conference. “We do that first as a top priority, and we’ll take care of these other obligations.”
Moments earlier, Johnson told GOP lawmakers in a closed-door meeting that their “hill to die on” in the negotiations was border policy, according to a Republican in the meeting. Conservatives are pressing for the provisions in H.R. 2, a bill they passed in May that would restart construction of walls along the southern border and make it drastically more difficult for migrants to claim asylum in the U.S.
Johnson reiterated his stance in a letter to the White House on Tuesday, one day after officials warned that the U.S. will run out of funding to send weapons and assistance to Ukraine by the end of the year, threatening its ability to fight Russia’s invasion.
The GOP’s demands could imperil any legislation that emerges from the Senate, where a bipartisan group is trying to find agreement on a pared-down set of border policy proposals. Republicans in those negotiations have acknowledged they are not insisting on the broad policies included in the House’s legislation, creating a schism between the two chambers.
Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., said it was “not rational” to expect the closely divided Senate to pass a bill that didn’t gain a single Democratic vote in the House.
“You can’t make law like that,” Lankford said. “We have to make law.”
So far, the Senate negotiations have centered on a proposal to raise the initial threshold for migrants to enter the asylum system, as well as limiting the executive branch’s ability to admit migrants through humanitarian parole.
Democrats took a step back from the talks earlier this week, saying that Republicans were unwilling to compromise. Republican senators are making a counter-offer, but still say they will block the funding package if it does not include border security policy they can agree on.
As the talks go on, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer was pushing toward a test vote Wednesday on emergency funding for Ukraine, Israel, and other national security needs, but without the border provisions Republicans are demanding.
Schumer said he expected Zelenskyy, making his fourth formal address to senators since the start of the war in February 2022, to deliver a blunt message: “Without more aid from Congress, Ukraine may fall.”
House lawmakers were also set to hear from national security adviser Jake Sullivan about the urgency of providing assistance. Republicans in the House remain deeply skeptical of sending more wartime funding to Ukraine, and some have said they won’t support it even if it is paired with hard-line border policy.
The White House has declined to discuss publicly the details of the border negotiations and urged lawmakers to pass Biden’s emergency funding request expeditiously.
“I think that the president has been very, very clear and senior administration officials will be very clear to every single member of the House and Senate today about what the stakes are in Ukraine at this moment,” Olivia Dalton, the White House principal deputy press secretary, said Tuesday on Air Force One while Biden traveled to Boston for campaign fundraisers.
Johnson, a hard-line conservative, voted against security assistance for Ukraine in September, but since becoming speaker has been more receptive to funding the country’s military, warning that Russian President Vladimir Putin cannot be allowed to prevail.
Still, Johnson said he wanted more information from the White House on the strategy for exiting the conflict.
“What is the objective? What is the endgame in Ukraine? How are we going to have proper oversight of the funds?” the speaker said.
The charged dynamic has lawmakers deeply worried that Congress could fail to pass the funding by the end of the year.
“The world needs to be very concerned about what’s happening here,” said Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., on Monday night. “Republicans have decided to hold Ukraine funding hostage to a domestic political priority that is amongst the hardest in American politics to solve.”
___
Associated Press writers Kevin Freking and Seung Min Kim contributed reporting.
___
This story corrects that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s video address Tuesday is the fourth time he has addressed senators, not the third.
veryGood! (3166)
Related
- $73.5M beach replenishment project starts in January at Jersey Shore
- Stock market today: World shares gain on back of Wall Street rally as war shock to markets fades
- How Will and Jada Pinkett Smith's Daughter Willow Reacted to Bombshell Book Revelations
- Rolls-Royce is cutting up to 2,500 jobs in an overhaul of the UK jet engine maker
- Highlights from Trump’s interview with Time magazine
- Stock market today: World shares gain on back of Wall Street rally as war shock to markets fades
- Keith Richards opens up on adapting guitar skills due to arthritis: 'You're always learning'
- Four men held in central Georgia jail escaped and a search is underway, sheriff says
- Meet first time Grammy nominee Charley Crockett
- A $1.4 million ticket for speeding? Georgia man shocked by hefty fine, told it's no typo
Ranking
- Selena Gomez's "Weird Uncles" Steve Martin and Martin Short React to Her Engagement
- How Will and Jada Pinkett Smith's Daughter Willow Reacted to Bombshell Book Revelations
- What to know about Elijah McClain’s death and the cases against police and paramedics
- Suzanne Somers dies at 76: 'Three's Company' co-star Joyce DeWitt, husband Alan Hamel mourn actress
- Meet first time Grammy nominee Charley Crockett
- New Mexico governor: state agencies must switch to all-electric vehicle fleet by the year 2035
- UN refugee chief says Rohingya who fled Myanmar must not be forgotten during other world crises
- Taylor Swift's 'The Eras Tour' dances to No. 1 at the box office, eyeing 'Joker' film record
Recommendation
The city of Chicago is ordered to pay nearly $80M for a police chase that killed a 10
Rite Aid files for bankruptcy amid opioid-related lawsuits and falling sales
Colombia signs three-month cease-fire with FARC holdout group
Colombia signs three-month cease-fire with FARC holdout group
San Francisco names street for Associated Press photographer who captured the iconic Iwo Jima photo
Stock market today: World shares gain on back of Wall Street rally as war shock to markets fades
Justice Barrett expresses support for a formal US Supreme Court ethics code in Minnesota speech
Waiting for news, families of Israeli hostages in Gaza tell stories of their loved ones