US House speaker blasts Israel, Ukraine aid package as Senate advances bill
Al Jazeera
Republican Mike Johnson says the bill does not address the ‘most pressing’ issue of security at the US-Mexico border.
United States House of Representatives Speaker Mike Johnson has cast doubt on the fate of a $95.3bn aid package for countries including Ukraine and Israel as the Senate voted to advance the legislation aimed at reassuring Washington’s allies.
Johnson, the top Republican in the House, said the Senate had “failed to meet the moment” by not addressing security on the US-Mexico border, which he described as the “most pressing issue facing our country”.
“The mandate of national security supplemental legislation was to secure America’s own border before sending additional foreign aid around the world,” Johnson said in a statement on Monday. “It is what the American people demand and deserve.”
Johnson previously said that an earlier version of the bill would be “dead on arrival” as curbs it placed on unauthorised migration did not go far enough.
Last week, a majority of Senate Republicans voted to kill a bipartisan bill that included the most comprehensive immigration reforms in years amid opposition by former President Donald Trump, who has led his party to adopt more sceptical stances towards immigration and intervention overseas.
