3:00 PM ET, April 20, 2024
White House decides on emergency foreign aid after months of wrangling
From CNN’s Priscilla Alvarez
The White House on Saturday decided to provide emergency foreign aid after months of turmoil over a stand-up and standstill in Congress, but it was temporarily delayed by border security, one of President Joe Biden’s most politically vulnerable issues. was overturned.
The request for additional aid to Ukraine, among other priorities, dates back to October, when the White House submitted a request for additional national security funding. Over the past few months, Mr. Biden has touted the need to provide additional funding to the war-torn country as a national security priority and warned against ceding any ground to Russia.
More recently, U.S. officials claimed that losses on the battlefield in Ukraine were due to a lack of additional support from the United States. In February, for example, the White House laid the blame for the withdrawal from Ukraine’s main city, Avdiivka, squarely at the feet of congressional Republicans.
Funding for Ukraine has also been a recurring topic between Biden and world leaders as the United States seeks to reassert its leadership on the world stage. This theme was echoed in the president’s statement on Saturday.
“Today, members of both parties of Congress resolved to advance our national security interests and send a clear message about the power of American leadership on the world stage. At this critical juncture, they resolved to heed the call of history. We came together to respond and passed urgently needed national security legislation that I have been fighting to secure for months,” Biden said.
