Senate funding plan hits GOP turbulence over Ukraine

A number of Senate Republicans are threatening to oppose legislation to fund the government beyond Sept. 30 because of $6.1 billion in funding for Ukraine and the lack of language addressing the huge surge of migrants across the U.S.-Mexico border.  

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) and Sen. Susan Collins (Maine), the senior Republican on the Appropriations Committee, are the chief proponents for passing the bill but got pushback from disgruntled GOP colleagues Wednesday.  

McConnell repeated his calls to fund the government and not to abandon Ukraine in the middle of its war against Russia.  

“We’re all familiar with the choice we have before us: shut down the government, or keep the government open up until Nov. 17 and give us a chance to continue to resolve a number of the appropriations issues,” he said.  

But his effort to continue helping Ukraine is running into stiff opposition from fellow Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul (R). 

“I will use every tool I can to prevent it from easily passing. We don’t have any extra money. We borrowed $1 trillion in the last three months. We basically borrow the money from China to send it to Ukraine. It’s not making us stronger, it’s making us weaker.”

McConnell on Wednesday showed no willingness to drop the Ukraine money, which was included in the bill a week after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s visit to Washington.  

“I’m comfortable with the way we put together the Senate bill. It basically is trying to do just a continuation until Nov. 17. This crafted package is the result of a lot of discussion. I think it makes sense for the Senate. I also think it makes sense for the country,” he said.  

Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.) also defended the $6.15 billion for Ukraine as “a continuation of the current policy.”  

“Obviously this is one of the policy issues that we’re going to be arguing about the next 45 days if we can get the [continuing resolution] across the finish line,” he said. “This is just a temporary plug.” 

But he acknowledged it’s “conceivable” that Paul will delay Senate passage of the funding measure until Sunday — a day past the deadline for a shutdown. 

The possibility of a shutdown did appear to become more likely Wednesday, with the Senate bill hitting opposition, and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) telling members of his conference that he won’t even bring a Senate-passed funding bill to the House floor for a vote.

McCarthy wants to bring a House GOP measure to fund the government for a short time to the floor, but it’s not clear he has the support in his conference to win that vote. The House GOP bill would not win support from Democrats and would be dead on arrival in the Senate.

The Speaker could change his mind as the minutes click down to a shutdown, particularly if his own bill fails to win support from his conference. But bringing the Senate bill to the floor risks setting off a challenge to McCarthy’s Speakership from conservatives who insist McCarthy should not lean on Democrats to keep the government open.

McConnell played down the Senate’s stark differences with the Speaker.  

“Well, you know for over 200 years the Senate and House has been very different. What we’re focusing on here in the Senate is to try to keep the government open, try to continue to pay people who are essential to our security like air traffic controllers, border patrol, Capitol police,” he said. “I don’t want to give the Speaker any advice on how to run the House.” 

The Senate bill still seems likely to get through the chamber, but the disagreements could lead to a bumpy road and complicates efforts to win approval before Sunday, when the shutdown would start, without new legislation.

Some Republican senators are also complaining that the bill has a slim prospect of passing the GOP-controlled House and doesn’t have enough funding to replenish the federal disaster relief fund, which is running out of money.  

Senate Republicans debated at their Wednesday lunch whether to keep the money for Ukraine in the bill, broaden its potential use to also cover Taiwan or whether to pull the funding completely.  

Most of the debate was focused on what to do about Ukraine funding, but senators also discussed the need to do address border security and the shortfall in disaster relief funding.   

Paul rejected the possibility that he would drop his opposition if he gets a vote on an amendment or some other concession that wouldn’t necessarily affect the Ukraine funding.  

“No, they need to take the Ukraine money off of this. It’s insulting to Americans and those who work in our government that we’re going to fund the Ukrainian government — if there’s a shutdown, they will continue to pay Ukrainian government workers while our workers go unpaid,” he said.  

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) on Wednesday dismissed the Senate stopgap funding measure as a “waste” of time, given the opposition it will face from House conservatives. 

“It makes absolutely no sense for the Senate to waste the rest of this week voting on a spending bill that is dead on arrival in the House. In fact, it guarantees a shutdown. I will only vote for a bill viable in both chambers that will prevent a shutdown, which is why I would vote against the Schumer bill in its current form,” Tillis said in a statement.  

“The [continuing resolution] in its current form I have no intention of voting for,” he said. “We’re trying to identify [provisions] that address the problem at the border.”  

“I want to support things that actually reduce future flows” of migrants, he added.  

Collins, the vice chairwoman of the Appropriations Committee, told colleagues she would be open to adding border security language, pointing out the bill can still be amended because it hasn’t come to the floor, said a senator who attended the meeting.  

Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) is balking at the bill for not including enough money for disaster relief, nor language to allow disaster assistance to be distributed in the form of block grants.  

Scott called the $6 billion in new disaster relief funding in the continuing resolution “totally inadequate for Floridians, our farmers and every American fighting to recover from recent disasters.” 

He wants to add at least another $10 billion on top of the $6 billion already in the bill for the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s disaster relief fund.  

“We have to add the block grant language. Vilsack has made the decision he will not give our farmers money,” he said, referring to Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack.  

He said that Vilsack is claiming he doesn’t have the authority to distribute block grants to states to speed up disaster relief to farmers.  

“The way you get this money out faster — you still live by all the standards — is you give it to the state department of ag[riculture] or the governor’s office,” Scott said.  

 Aris Folley and Mychael Schnell contributed.