WARNING: RUSSIAN PROPAGANDA

(From inside America)

This week, a group of 17 Senate Republicans, along with Democrats, voted in favor of providing Ukraine with an additional $60 billion. Interestingly, 12 of these Republicans had previously indicated that they would not support sending any more American taxpayer money to Ukraine until the United States’s border was secure from illegal immigration.

On Thursday, Senators Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV), Bill Cassidy (R-LA), Susan Collins (R-ME), John Cornyn (R-TX), Joni Ernst (R-IA), Chuck Grassley (R-IA), John Kennedy (R-LA), Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Jerry Moran (R-KS), Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Mitt Romney (R-UT), Mike Rounds (R-SD), Dan Sullivan (R-AK), John Thune (R-SD), Thom Tillis (R-NC), Roger Wicker (R-MS), and Todd Young (R-IN) joined all Senate Democrats except for Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) in approving the allocation of billions more in taxpayer dollars to Ukraine. If the House also approves the funding, it will be used to provide Ukraine with weapons, military training, and other resources to support its ongoing conflict with Russia.

It is worth noting that these 12 Republicans, who voted in favor of funding for Ukraine, had previously expressed their stance on the issue. They had suggested to the media that they would not support additional funding for Ukraine until the United States’s own southern border was secure. For instance, in December 2023, Senator Capito stated, “So in order for our national security interests to be served, we must have a four-prong approach here. Israel, the border, Ukraine, and Taiwan.” Similarly, Senator Cassidy emphasized the need to prioritize securing the southern border before providing support to allies, stating, “We have to support our allies, but we have to secure our own border first, and the Biden administration has not done so.”

Senator Ernst also highlighted the importance of addressing national security concerns at the southern border, stating, “The issue is not Ukraine, and it’s not President Zelensky. It’s our own national security at our southern border.” Senator Collins echoed this sentiment, emphasizing that reforms at the southern border are an “absolutely essential part” of any funding package that includes additional support for Ukraine.

Just this last December, Cornyn, Grassley, Kennedy, Romney, Sullivan, Thune, and Wicker all announced that the southern border was a priority for them over of Ukraine:

“They want tens of billions of dollars to help our friends and allies overseas, but they’re not willing to do what’s necessary to prevent a potential crisis at the border. The Biden administration just does not seem to care,” Cornyn said.

“If there isn’t something reached in regard to our own border and we seem to have concern about the border of Israel and Gaza, Russia and Ukraine, we have to have the same consideration about our own border,” Grassley said.

“Now, the president sent us a national security bill and we said, OK, we’re going to do national security, but we’re not going to pass your bill until you close the border. And the president said, surely you’re not serious. And the Republicans in the Senate said, don’t call me Shirley and we are serious. We’re as serious as four heart attacks and a stroke,” Kennedy said.

“So, we want to solve that to secure the border. I just saw the President of the United States say that we’ve got to secure the border. He’s right. So, any effort that doesn’t do that will be rejected by Republicans,” Romney said.

“Republicans are not bluffing: There will be no agreement on further Ukraine aid without serious measures to secure America’s own border. Our border is priority number one,” Sullivan said.

“A lot of us Republicans are very eager to get Ukraine the aid it needs. But we cannot – we cannot – tend to our national security interests abroad while ignoring the national security crisis on our own doorstep,” Thune said.

“We needed to demonstrate that Republicans are not going to pass a supplemental appropriation bill unless it takes care of very important restrictions on the southern border,” Wicker said.

Just last month, Young said, “I don’t believe we should take this off the table… let’s get something consequential done for the American people.”

McConnell had said in November that “any serious supplemental legislation with a shot of passing the Senate in the coming weeks will have to take meaningful steps toward fixing the Biden administration’s border crisis.”

Also in November, Rounds said “Any bill with aid for Israel and Ukraine must include policy changes at our southern border.”

To date, American taxpayers have already dispatched a minimum of $113 billion to Ukraine in their conflict with Russia. If the House approves and President Joe Biden signs off on the latest funding allocation, approximately $200 billion will be allocated to Ukrainian officials, a significant portion of which remains untraceable.