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Joe Biden pledged the US would continue to back Ukraine “as long as we can”, even as Republican leaders dashed hopes of a quick deal to provide funding to Kyiv despite personal pleas from Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Speaking at a joint press conference in Washington with Zelenskyy, the US president put a brave face on the US political deadlock over a request for an additional $60bn in security assistance to Kyiv, saying he remained hopeful of the possibility of an agreement.
“A clear bipartisan majority of people across the United States and in Congress support your country,” Biden said. “They understand, as do I, that Ukraine’s success and its ability to deter aggression in the future are vital to security for the world at large. Ukraine will emerge from this war proud, free and firmly rooted, unless we walk away.”
Biden signed off on an additional $200mn in security aid for Ukraine during Zelenskyy’s visit. However, the White House has warned these are the final tranches of aid and the funds will run out by the end of the year. In the past, Biden had pledged to back Kyiv “as long as it takes” to defeat Russian forces, but his language was more sober on Tuesday.
“We’ll continue to supply Ukraine with critical weapons and equipment as long as we can . . . but without supplemental funding, we’re rapidly coming to an end of our ability to help Ukraine respond to the urgent operational demands that it has,” Biden said.
Republican leaders in Congress have conditioned any new assistance for Ukraine on strict immigration curbs at the US’s southern border, which are unpalatable to the White House and Democrats. Even after meeting with Zelenskyy on Tuesday and hearing his ardent pleas for a quick deal, Republican leaders did not budge.
Mike Johnson, the speaker of the House of Representative, said: “We needed clarity on what we’re doing in Ukraine, and how we’ll have proper oversight of the spending of precious taxpayer dollars of the American citizens. And we needed a transformative change at the border.”
“Thus far, we’ve gotten neither,” he added.
Mitch McConnell, the top Republican in the Senate, told reporters it would be “practically impossible” for any deal to pass Congress before the Christmas holiday, even though he said the meeting with Zelenskyy was “inspiring”.
“Negotiating a border solution is very complicated,” he added. “The talks continue but we’re not there yet.”
Biden said White House officials were “working” with lawmakers to find a “bipartisan compromise both in terms of changes in policy and provide the resources we need to secure the border”.
But “holding Ukraine funding hostage in an attempt to force through an extreme Republican partisan agenda on the border is not how it works”, he added. “We need real solutions.”
Earlier in the day, Jake Sullivan, the White House’s national security adviser, had warned of the consequences of a lapse in US funding for Ukraine, calling it a “remarkable strategic own-goal by us”.
“It will mean a very specific deterioration in Ukraine’s capabilities to both hold territory and take territory, as well as to defend Ukrainian cities against an aerial assault by Russia,” he told a Wall Street Journal conference. “2024 will be a very difficult year, if we are not able to get the assistance to Ukraine.”
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