The Senate will hold a key procedural vote on whether to advance a supplemental funding bill that includes financial aid for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan as well as provisions aimed at bolstering border security.
The vote, which will be held on Wednesday afternoon, is expected to fail due to opposition from Senate Republicans, who have demanded stricter border regulations in exchange for their support.
The vote comes one day after Senate Democrats formally unveiled the $111bn supplemental security bill, reflecting the funding request that Joe Biden issued in October to provide assistance to America’s allies abroad.
Although the bill includes a number of border security measures, Republicans in both chambers have insisted the legislation must go further in restricting migrants’ asylum and parole applications. Those proposals are a non-starter for many Democrats, making it unclear how a supplemental bill can pass the divided Congress.
Those tensions spilled over on Tuesday night, when a classified Senate briefing on Ukraine erupted into a shouting match. The Ukrainian president, Volodymr Zelenskiy, was scheduled to speak at the briefing, but he was forced to cancel due to a “last-minute” issue, according to the Senate majority leader, the Democrat Chuck Schumer.
The briefing still occurred despite Zelenskiy’s absence, but Schumer then accused Republicans of having “hijacked” the meeting to discuss border security. Republicans then criticized Schumer for refusing to address the crucial issues that created the current standoff.
“Republicans are just walking out of the briefing because the people there are not willing to actually discuss what it takes to get a deal done,” Senator Mitt Romney, a Republican of Utah, said.
With no resolution in sight, Senate Republicans are expected to successfully filibuster the supplemental security bill, blocking it from advancing. The impasse increases the likelihood that Congress will fail to approve more aid for Ukraine before the end of the year, as the White House has warned that Kyiv is desperately in need of more financial assistance.
“I want to be clear: without congressional action, by the end of the year we will run out of resources to procure more weapons and equipment for Ukraine and to provide equipment from US military stocks,” Shalanda Young, the director of the Office of Management and Budget, wrote in a letter to congressional leaders on Monday.
“There is no magical pot of funding available to meet this moment. We are out of money – and nearly out of time.”
