By KEVIN FREKING (Associated Press)
WASHINGTON (AP) — Momentum towards passing a $1.7 trillion authorities funding invoice with extra assist for Ukraine slowed significantly Wednesday as lawmakers struggled to achieve an settlement on amendments wanted to get to a last vote and keep away from a partial authorities shutdown at midnight Friday.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., mentioned the Senate was making progress, however lawmakers exited the chamber late within the night trying glum and speaking of a standoff.
“This bill is hanging by a thread,” mentioned Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del.
At concern is a proposed modification from Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, looking for to increase pandemic-era restrictions on asylum seekers on the border, additionally known as Title 42.
“Sen. Schumer doesn’t want to have a vote on Title 42 because he presumably knows it will pass,” Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, mentioned. But the House received’t go alongside, he mentioned, and “everything falls apart.”
The deadlock got here simply hours after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy sought to guarantee lawmakers throughout a joint assembly of Congress that the help the U.S. is offering was a lot appreciated and will “speed up our victory.” He projected confidence all through and even informed lawmakers in his closing: “Merry Christmas and a happy victorious New Year.”
“Your money is not charity. It’s an investment in the global security and democracy that we handle in the most responsible way,” Zelenskyy mentioned.
The measure contains $44.9 billion in emergency help to Ukraine and NATO allies, above even President Joe Biden’s request, and ensures that funding flows to the struggle effort for months to return. The measure would additionally enhance U.S. protection spending by about 10% to $858 billion, addressing issues from some lawmakers that extra funding within the nation’s army is required to make sure America’s safety.
Schumer’s hope was that the chamber would approve the invoice as quickly as Wednesday night time, however a number of lawmakers exited the chamber saying they didn’t count on any extra votes that night time. Once the Senate votes, the House will then must take it up and go the measure earlier than midnight Friday to keep away from a partial-government shutdown.
Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., emerged from a late-night assembly in Schumer’s workplace saying she was optimistic “about putting together a path” that will result in the invoice’s passage within the Senate on Thursday.
Schumer and Senate Republican chief Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., took to the ground Wednesday morning urging colleagues to vote for the measure, although they emphasised totally different priorities.
Schumer mentioned the worst factor Congress may do now’s give Russian President Vladimir Putin any sign that the U.S. was wavering in its dedication to defend Ukraine.
He doubled down on that message within the night, saying he had simply met with Zelenskyy.
“He made it clear that without this aid package, the Ukrainians will be in real trouble and could even lose the war,” Schumer mentioned. “So that makes the urgency of getting this legislation done all the more important.”
McConnell is going through pushback from many Republicans who don’t help the spending invoice and resent being compelled to vote on such an enormous bundle with so little time earlier than a possible shutdown and the Christmas vacation. He highlighted the invoice’s spending enhance for protection and mentioned that non-defense spending, when excluding an enormous enhance for veterans well being care, would enhance under the speed of inflation.
“If Republicans controlled this chamber, we would have handled the appropriations process entirely differently from top to bottom,” McConnell mentioned. “But given the reality of where we stand today, senators have two options this week, just two: we will either give our Armed Forces the resources and the certainty that they need, or we will deny it to them.”
The invoice, which runs for 4,155 pages, contains about $772.5 billion for non-defense, discretionary applications and $858 billion for protection and would finance companies by September.
Lawmakers labored to stuff as many priorities as they may into the sprawling bundle, doubtless the final main invoice of the present Congress. That contains $27 billion in catastrophe funding to assist communities recovering from disasters and excessive climate occasions in addition to an overhaul of federal election regulation that goals to forestall any future presidents or presidential candidates from attempting to overturn an election.
The bipartisan electoral overhaul was a direct response to former President Donald Trump’s efforts to persuade Republican lawmakers and then-Vice President Mike Pence to object to the certification of Biden’s victory on Jan. 6, 2021.
The spending invoice additionally comprises scores of coverage adjustments that lawmakers labored furiously to incorporate to keep away from having to start out over within the new Congress subsequent 12 months.
Examples embody a provision from Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., that bans TikTok on authorities cell telephones on account of safety issues. Another provision supported by the Maine delegation was added to help the state’s lobster and Jonah crab fisheries, delaying rules proposed to assist save endangered North Atlantic proper whales. And, on the well being care entrance, the invoice requires states to maintain kids enrolled in Medicaid on protection for a minimum of a 12 months, which advocates say will increase entry to preventative care.
However, tens of millions who enrolled within the well being care program for low-income Americans may begin to lose protection on April 1 as a result of the invoice sunsets a requirement of the COVID-19 public well being emergency that prohibited states from booting folks off Medicaid.
The invoice additionally offers roughly $15.3 billion for greater than 7,200 initiatives that lawmakers sought for his or her house states and districts. Under revamped guidelines for neighborhood challenge funding, additionally known as earmarks, lawmakers should publish their requests on-line and attest they haven’t any monetary curiosity within the initiatives. Still, many fiscal conservatives criticize the earmarking as resulting in pointless spending.
Some Republican senators are elevating objections to the measure, not solely as a result of the quantity of spending however due to Congress’s behavior of putting 12 separate appropriations payments into one large bundle lengthy after the fiscal 12 months has begun and simply earlier than vital deadlines method.
“Giving us a bill at 1:28 in the morning, that’s over 4,000 pages, that nobody will have an opportunity to read, that we’ll have no idea what’s in it, is not the way to run your personal life, your business life or your government,” mentioned Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla. “This has to stop.”
House Republicans, together with Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., doubtless the following speaker of the House, are encouraging their colleagues within the Senate to solely help a short-term extension. That method, they might have extra capacity to form the laws. McCarthy spoke to senators throughout their caucus lunch Wednesday. A discover despatched by GOP management to House members urged them to vote towards the measure in the case of the House.
“This deal is designed to sideline the incoming Republican House Majority by extending many programs for multiple years and providing large funding increases for Democrat priorities on top of the exorbitant spending that has already been appropriated this year,” the discover said.
Source: www.bostonherald.com”
