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Senate looks to clear aid bill Tuesday night with no amendments

David Lerman and Paul M. Krawzak, CQ-Roll Call on

Published in News & Features

WASHINGTON — Abandoning efforts to reach a deal on amendment votes, Senate leaders decided to power through opponents’ speechifying in hopes of clearing a $95.3 billion emergency aid package for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan by Tuesday night.

The outcome has never been in doubt, especially after the Senate voted 80-19 to limit debate on the long-stalled aid package earlier on Tuesday. But Senate leaders had been seeking an expedited timeline for final passage by achieving unanimous consent on amendment votes for a measure that faces opposition from both conservative Republicans and some progressive Democrats.

By Tuesday afternoon, that effort had collapsed and instead party leaders on both sides of the aisle decided to simply hand post-cloture time over to senators who wanted to speak for up to an hour each on the topic. Senators briefed on the procedure said they expected the bill’s critics to exhaust themselves by around 10 p.m. Tuesday, and without any additional speakers to claim floor time, final passage would come shortly thereafter.

“It’s going to pass overwhelmingly,” said Steve Daines, R-Mont., who himself had filed amendments earlier in the day. He said there were roughly nine senators expected to speak into the evening on the measure.

One of those, Marco Rubio, R-Fla., began his speech in the late afternoon. He complained that a border security package was missing from the bill, though Senate Republicans largely rejected a bipartisan compromise that had been agreed to earlier this year.

“This is not compromise. This is legislative blackmail. And I will not vote for blackmail,” Rubio said.

 

The Senate’s No. 2 Republican, South Dakota’s John Thune, had said earlier in the day that Republicans were seeking “a fairly narrow, finite list” of amendments that he called “manageable.”

But Thune also said negotiations “hit a snag” over the weekend with an amendment sought by Ted Cruz, R-Texas, dealing with the Houthi rebels in Yemen, who have waged missile attacks on ships in the Red Sea in response to the Israeli war in the Gaza Strip.

Republicans filed amendments to eliminate economic aid to Ukraine, restrict funding for Gaza and prevent the funding package from being designated as an emergency that avoids the need for offsetting cuts.

But some Republicans were also seeking to use the bill as leverage to push priorities unrelated to the wars in Ukraine and Israel or the national security demands of the Indo-Pacific region.

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