Senate Republicans prepare to fail vote on Ukraine funding deal

Tuesday, 6 February 2024, 23:20

The US Senate is unlikely to have enough Republican votes for a procedural vote on a bill to tighten migration policy, which also includes additional funding for Ukraine.

Source: European Pravda with reference to The Hill

Details: The Senate will vote on an accelerated consideration of the bill with a compromise on migration regulation and additional spending on national security (the so-called cloture motion) on Wednesday, 7 February.

Its adoption should allow for further fast-track consideration of the bill without further debate in the Senate, but requires a 60-vote majority – i.e. at least nine Republicans.

However, Republican Senator John Thune, who is responsible for party discipline, said that his fellow party members were "unlikely" to cast their votes because they wanted more time to study the details of the bill.

Quote: "My intention is to, at least on the motion (of the bill – ed.) to proceed, to vote where I think most of our conference is going to be, which is no," he said. 

If the Senate fails to support the cloture motion on 7 February, they will not be able to return to the bill until 26 February at the earliest due to a two-week recess.

Reminder: After several months of negotiations, the US Senate presented a bipartisan US$118 billion border security bill, which also includes more than US$60 billion in aid to Ukraine and more than US$14 billion to Israel.

In the meantime, Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson said he would not put the Senate bill to a vote. President Joe Biden said that Donald Trump, his predecessor, was trying to get the bill to fail in the Senate.

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