Democrats seek to salvage Ukraine aid after Senate vote fails

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Senate Republicans voted down a measure to increase funding for Ukraine on Wednesday, triggering a rush by Democrats to pass another aid bill as US President Joe Biden warned lawmakers risked abandoning Kyiv at a critical moment.

The $118bn bipartisan spending bill that was rejected on Wednesday had tied support for Kyiv to a crackdown on immigration at the US-Mexico border. Republicans had abandoned it after Donald Trump trashed the deal.

Its failure sparked a salvage effort by Democrats, with Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer proposing a “Plan B” to keep funding for Kyiv intact — raising hopes that further US backing for Ukraine could yet be agreed.

Schumer’s new proposal cuts out border measures but leaves in place $60bn of funding for Ukraine, as well as support for Israel and Taiwan and billions of dollars in humanitarian aid for Gaza and other areas of the world. But it remained far from certain late Wednesday whether the revised bill would be able to garner enough support to pass the upper chamber of Congress.

The Senate voted 58-41 to clear one of several legislative hurdles to consider Schumer’s revised proposal on Wednesday afternoon, after eight Republican senators voted in favour of the plan. The bill will need 60 votes to advance.

Schumer said the Senate would go home on Wednesday night “to give our Republican colleagues the night to figure themselves out” and reconvene for the next vote on Thursday afternoon.

The possible breakthrough on Ukraine funding would be welcomed in Europe, amid mounting anxiety among Washington’s allies about a collapse in US funding for Kyiv’s effort to win back territory captured by Russia and withstand further attacks.

Speaking to donors at a fundraiser in New York on Wednesday, Biden said Russian President Vladimir Putin was “on the balls of his heels”.

“And what are we doing? Stepping back?” the US president added.

The US was the “essential nation”, he said. “If the United States steps out of events, what happens?”

“What happens in the Middle East?” Biden said. “The Taiwan Strait? What happens in Asia? What happens with Ukraine?”

Even if the Senate approves Schumer’s alternative plan, the Speaker of the House of Representatives Mike Johnson — a Trump ally — would need to agree to hold a vote in the lower chamber. He declined on Wednesday morning to give his view of Schumer’s proposal.

“We will see what the Senate does,” he told reporters. “We are allowing the process to play out, and we will handle it as it is sent over [from the Senate].”

“I have made very clear that you have to address these issues on their own merits, and Israel desperately needs the assistance, everybody knows that,” Johnson added.

A separate proposal introduced in the House this week by Johnson to increase aid only for Israel failed in a vote on Tuesday night.

As international attention focused on the Senate on Wednesday, the White House warned that it was not focusing on contingency plans to circumvent the legislature if it continues to block extra Ukraine funding.

“We’re focused on passing a bipartisan support package for Ukraine that will provide it with the tools and capabilities it needs to continue to defend effectively and take back territory that Russia currently occupies,” US national security adviser Jake Sullivan said on Wednesday in Brussels, where he met Nato secretary-general Jens Stoltenberg.

“At the end of the day, there is no alternative to the United States stepping up to the plate and providing a level of resources that allow Ukraine to have the artillery, the air defence systems and the other capabilities they need,” Sullivan added.

Stoltenberg reiterated the importance of support from Nato, including the US, to help Ukraine take back territory and demonstrate Russia made a strategic mistake in invading.

“We are focusing on Plan A, and that is that all allies continue to support Ukraine,” Stoltenberg said. “I expect the US to make decisions in the future to continue to support Ukraine.”