Sen. Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) pointed to two overriding factors that delayed the $60 billion Ukraine aid package even as the country runs short of materiel amid mounting casualties: Tucker Carlson's conspiracies and Donald Trump's waffling.
“The demonization of Ukraine began by Tucker Carlson, who in my opinion ended up where he should have been all along, which is interviewing Vladimir Putin,” McConnell told reporters at a press conference. “And so he had an enormous audience, which convinced a lot of rank and file Republicans that maybe this was a mistake.”
Regarding the presidential front-runner, McConnell said: “I think the former president had sort of mixed views on” Ukraine, before suggesting that Trump's insistence that Republicans torpedo the bipartisan border deal attached to the military aid bill exacerbated tensions. Alluding to the GOP's minority, the Kentucky Republican added that passing legislation “requires you to deal with Democrats, and then a number of our members thought it wasn't good enough.”
NBC News continues:
“And then our nominee for president didn't seem to want us to do anything at all,” McConnell said. “That took months to work our way through it.”
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McConnell, who consistently bucked loud conservative voices in his party who opposed Ukraine funding, argued that the margin of support for the war-torn country is an indication the Republican Party is tracking back to its Reaganesque roots of defending the encroachment on democracy around the world.
McConnell said he remains committed to working to help regain a Republican Senate majority, despite his plans to step back from leadership at the end of the year. He said he believes the crop of candidates the Republicans have recruited are more inclined to back away from the party's recent isolationist tendencies.
“I think we've turned the corner on the isolationist movement,” McConnell said. “I've noticed how uncomfortable proponents of that are when you call them isolationist. So I think we've made some progress and I think it's gonna have to continue because we got big, big problems: China, Russia, Iran. Going into World War II we just had Germany and Japan.”
The Senate legislation combined the House's four bills into one. Besides Ukraine aid, it includes $26 billion in security assistance for Israel and $8 billion to bolster Taiwan's defenses. After months of consternation, mostly from hardline Republicans in the House, the final vote in the Senate wasn't close. Only fifteen Republicans and three Democrats opposed the legislation.
The fourth House bill incorporated in the Senate's version increases sanctions on Russia for its war of aggression. It contains provisions that could ban the Chinese-owned social media app TikTok.
Once President Biden signs the package into law, Chinese internet technology company ByteDance has nine months to sell TikTok before the app is banned.
In response to the latest developments from Washington, Russia's defense chief issued a scathing statement, threatening to step up attacks on Ukraine.
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