Senate Republicans are urging President Mike Johnson (R-La.) not to make any promises to Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) about future military aid to Ukraine, warning that it would be a “serious mistake” for the President of the Chamber. box yourself in.
Senators expect the Biden administration to request another round of aid to Ukraine later in the year and want Johnson to have the flexibility to approve it in the House.
Greene asked Johnson during a meeting on Monday to commit to no longer supporting foreign assistance to Ukraine.
But given that House Democrats have committed to overturning Greene’s motion to vacate the House speaker’s seat, Republican senators see little reason for Johnson to rule out another aid package, which could embolden Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“I just think at this point you can’t tie his hands. He’s the speaker of the House,” Senate Republican leader John Thune (SD) told reporters on Tuesday.
“Right now, he has a job to do. Who knows what in the future may or may not be necessary or necessary?” he added. “I wouldn’t make any commitments about what he will or won’t move in response to the demands she’s making.”
Thune is running to become the next Senate GOP leader and could be tasked with proposing another emergency defense spending package in the next Congress.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), who is competing with Thune to become the next Senate Republican leader, agreed that Johnson should not make major concessions to Greene on Ukraine financing.
“I don’t believe Speaker Johnson needs to make any commitments to Marjorie Taylor Greene. I think she is marginalizing herself and becoming a problem,” he said on Tuesday afternoon.
Asked last week whether Republicans are fed up with Greene being the face of House Republicans, Cornyn responded: “I think people are fed up with the chaos and the dysfunction.”
Greene laid out her demands in exchange for not calling an early leadership election during a two-hour meeting with Johnson on Monday.
One of his top priorities is for Johnson to promise that he will not support any more aid to Ukraine.
She also called on the House speaker to defund special counsel Jack Smith’s investigations into former President Trump, to promise to allow votes only on legislation that had majority support in the House GOP conference, and to apply an overall cut of 1 percent on spending if Congress fails to pass its annual appropriations bills on time.
GOP senators, however, warn that any legislation that could defund special counsel investigations has no chance of becoming law, given Democratic control of the Senate and the White House.
And they warn that an automatic 1% cut in discretionary spending would especially affect the Department of Defense.
Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, warned that it would be a “serious mistake” for Johnson to promise Greene not to bring further military assistance to Ukraine to the House floor.
Wicker said the government “possibly” could request additional military assistance before the end of the year.
Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) expressed disbelief that a backbencher in the House would attempt to dictate national security policy to future administrations and the rest of Congress.
“You know what? She’s one person in a body of 435. Tell me how one person can literally control the entire Chamber,” she said. “Am I forgetting something?”
Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) said he will make increasing defense spending one of his top priorities for the rest of this year and after he steps down as leader.
“The next thing to focus on is the Department of Defense budget for next year. The president’s requests were not adequate. We need to make sure we are doing more on defense through the regular appropriations process,” McConnell told reporters after Congress approved $61 billion for Ukraine last month.
Senate aides expect the Biden administration to return to Congress for another request for military aid to Ukraine after the November elections, likely in late November or December.
National security adviser Jake Sullivan estimated that the aid package approved by Congress in April – and which President Biden initially requested in October – will keep Ukrainian forces well supplied until the end of the year.
A congressional aide estimated that Defense Department officials would begin drafting a new request for more military aid to Ukraine in September.
Greene wants Johnson to commit to canceling the next round of assistance to Ukraine before the administration even organizes it.
Greene noted at a May 1 press conference that Johnson voted against financing the war in Ukraine when she voted for him to become speaker of the House in October.
And she cited Johnson’s support for the war in Ukraine as cementing her decision to force a vote on a motion to vacate the House speaker’s seat.
“Mike Johnson has fully bought into Washington, D.C.’s disgusting business model for financing forever wars,” she declared. “The one-party party is ‘make Ukraine great again.’ The purpose of the one party is to finance all foreign wars.”
Senate Republicans are quite exasperated by Greene’s threat to force an early leadership election.
GOP senators have complained for months that the repeated threats using the motion against Johnson only created “chaos” in the chamber and damaged the Republican Party’s brand with voters.
McConnell said last week that he hoped Republicans and Democrats would unite to defeat Greene’s challenge to Johnson, which he hopes will bring more stability to the House.
“I’m relieved, as I think all of America is, that the chaos in the House will be stopped,” McConnell told reporters when asked about Greene’s plan to force a vote on the motion to vacate this week.
Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), an adviser to the Senate GOP leadership team, said Greene’s war on the House speaker is dragging the rest of the party down.
“She’s a horrible leader,” he told CNN in an interview last month. “She is dragging our brand down. She – not the Democrats – is the biggest risk to us regaining the majority.”
Other senators were more diplomatic, despite being fed up with Greene’s persistent threat against the Speaker of the House.
“I’m holding back my words,” Wicker said as he entered a Senate GOP leadership meeting on Tuesday.
Updated at 9:17 a.m. ET
This story originally appeared on thehill.com read the full story
