https://ift.tt/npONGBZ House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre pushed back against growing concerns that Republican lawmakers would not keep aid flowing to Ukraine should they retake control of the U.S. House of Representatives in the November midterm election.
“The United States has provided Ukraine with robust bipartisan support,” she told reporters Wednesday. “We will continue to work with Congress as we have these past several months on these efforts and support Ukraine for as long as it takes.”
The United States has authorized more than $60 billion in aid to Ukraine, with more than $17 billion in security assistance disbursed since the war began in February.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, however, indicated that aid could slow down should the chamber be controlled by Republicans.
On Tuesday, McCarthy told Punchbowl News that with a recession coming, Americans are not going to write “a blank check” to Ukraine. “They just won’t do it. … It’s not a free blank check,” he said.
Ukrainians, still reeling from Russian drone and missile attacks on their capital, Kyiv, and other cities, leaving much of the country without power, are closely following the U.S. midterm election process, said Olena Shuliak, chairwoman of Ukraine’s ruling Servant of the People Party.
“Our people die every day. Every day, we stand defending democracy in the whole world,” she told VOA Ukrainian. “You can see what is happening daily with the shelling and destruction of our houses and killing of our people — you can’t decrease the support only to increase it.”
Observers say that with rising isolationist tendencies in the Republican Party, some worry that aid to Ukraine would wane, particularly for humanitarian and economic needs. There is less concern for U.S. security assistance, however, considering Republicans generally support the military industrial complex, said Kristine Berzina, a senior fellow for security and defense policy at the German Marshall Fund of the United States.