Trump-Influenced Speaker Johnson Dithers While Ukraine Hangs in the Balance - Horowitz

Trump-Influenced Speaker Johnson Dithers While Ukraine Hangs in the Balance - Horowitz

 

As the brave Ukrainians' reserves of ammunition were reaching dangerously low levels, resulting in their abandonment of a strategically key city last week, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) fatuously declared that on Ukraine aid, “he won’t be rushed.” Refusing to schedule a vote on the military and foreign aid package containing the ammunition and weaponry Ukraine now desperately needs, the speaker blithely adjourned the House of Representatives for a two-week vacation.  He did so despite the fact that the package had passed by an overwhelming 70-29 margin in the US Senate and that it would pass by a substantial majority in the House of Representatives if brought to the floor for a vote.

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Continuing to take a sledgehammer to his already badly fraying credibility, Mr. Johnson looked into the camera and with a straight face insisted that his concern was that the package that emerged from the Senate didn’t have any border security provisions.  This was, of course, after he had refused to take yes for an answer on a measure that combined military and foreign aid with strong border security provisions negotiated by Senator James Lankford (R-OK), short-circuiting its progress in the US Senate by declaring it was dead on arrival in the House.

Speaker Johnson continues to put doing the bidding of Donald Trump and his MAGA-allies in the House of Representatives ahead of giving the brave Ukrainians the ammunition that the speaker himself has acknowledged they need to continue to repel Vladmir Putin’s unjustified brutal invasion of their country.  Donald Trump opposed the bipartisan border deal contained in the initial Senate package because he feared it would help Joe Biden in the election and Mr. Johnson and too many other Republicans obediently followed suite.  Mr. Trump now opposes the current package without the border security provisions as well. This is in keeping with his isolationist America First foreign policy views and his barely hidden admiration and sympathies for Vladimir Putin and other authoritarians.  While Mike Johnson, in rhetoric, is more supportive of Ukraine than the former president, his actions speak louder.

The bottom line: Mike Johnson’s political games have already delayed resupplying Ukraine by at least 5 months.  Now, there is no time left to waste.  Vladmir Putin isn’t going to pause his current offensive to meet Mr. Johnson’s political timeline. In fact, emboldened by an apparent loss of American resolve, he will do the opposite, pressing an advantage that without Mr. Johnson and Congressional Republicans’ dithering he would've never had.

The courageous Russian dissident and opposition leader, Alexei Navalny’s death under suspicious circumstances in a Siberian prison --where he was languishing on false charges-- and the arrests of hundreds of people who attended memorial services for him should remind us of the fundamental nature of Vladmir Putin and what it is at stake in Ukraine. Vladmir Putin has invaded another sovereign nation and sought to take it over simply because he thought that he had the military power to succeed. If successful in Ukraine, he is unlikely to stop there as he seeks to fulfill his proclaimed ambition to reclaim the old Russian Empire by force.  He can be counted on to rule any new territory he gains with an iron fist.

So far, Ukraine has succeeded in defending itself against Russia’s brutal invasion, degrading most of its conventional military power, and forcing this far larger and more powerful nation to rely on arms purchased from Iran and North Korea.  Ukraine is doing so without any American or other NATO countries' troops on the ground. To continue to hold the Russians at bay, however, requires resupplying of weapons and ammunition, a chunk of which we are the only allied nation with the capacity to provide. 

In other words, Speaker Johnson continuing to stand in the way of providing Ukraine with the arms they need risks turning a historic victory that stops Vladmir Putin in his tracks and sends a strong message of deterrence to China, Iran and our other adversaries into a catastrophic defeat that would result in 44 million Ukrainians living under tyranny.

I am still optimistic that there will be a legislative workaround to secure Ukraine the aid it needs before it’s too late.   Among the possibilities are to bypass the speaker through securing the signatures of a majority of House members on a discharge petition that by rule would bring the bill directly to the floor or tinkering with the package by adding back a few border provisions, as well as reducing the amount of aid in the legislation to give Mr. Johnson sufficient political cover that he will allow a vote on it.

There is simply no more time for Speaker Johnson to straddle the fence. Liz Cheney told Jake Tapper on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday, the Republican party now has a Putin-wing and Donald Trump is its chief, but, unfortunately, no longer its only apostle.  As a far better and far more honorable Republican president, Ronald Reagan, once said in a famous speech that helped launch his national political career, it’s “a time for choosing.” Speaker Johnson must choose whether to continue to appease Donald Trump and his extreme MAGA allies, some of whom join Trump in his affinity for Putin, or to ensure that Ukraine is resupplied in time to prevent Russia from forcibly taking more Ukrainian territory, easing its path to the eventual conquest of the entire nation.

There is a fair chance no matter what the speaker decides that the majority will in the House prevails. It would be far more certain and expeditious, however, if Speaker Johnson actually took a political risk and did the right thing.