“What I hope is that the Home will take up the Senate invoice and let the Home work its approach. If they alter it and ship it again right here, we’ve got additional delays,” McConnell mentioned on Tuesday afternoon. “We don’t need the Russians to win in Ukraine. So, we’ve got a time drawback right here. And I feel one of the simplest ways to maneuver rapidly and get the invoice to the president can be for the Home to take up the Senate invoice and move it.”
He equally advocated for the Senate’s laws within the non-public assembly, in response to two individuals accustomed to the sitdown.
McConnell’s transfer underscored that the 2 males are dealing in dramatically disparate methods with related pressures they face from conservatives who’ve no real interest in passing Ukraine assist. Whereas McConnell is delicate to Johnson’s powerful place, their younger relationship is totally different from his partnership with former Speaker Kevin McCarthy, who received broad deference from McConnell throughout final yr’s debt ceiling negotiations.
Nonetheless, Tuesday’s assembly showcased Johnson’s isolation amongst congressional leaders. And whereas standing other than the Senate is just not an unpopular place within the raucous Home GOP, it complicates Johnson’s stewardship of the chamber given the variety of coverage, political and tactical variations that congressional Republicans face in a vital election yr.
Whereas McConnell, 82, views the combat for Ukraine assist as essential to his 40-year Senate legacy, Johnson is roughly 5 months right into a shock ascension as speaker and already going through heavy turbulence from his personal members. Even Democrats are sympathetic to Johnson’s ever-present menace of an ouster if conservatives resolve to drive a vote of no confidence in his speakership.
McConnell faces his fair proportion of criticisms from his rank and file, however not less than he is aware of his conservative foes probably have to attend till November’s management elections to air them formally.
“I don’t know what number of political lives he has,” Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) mentioned of the speaker. “However I feel it’s actually necessary that we get [Ukraine] carried out.”
Cornyn advised Johnson might add a hardline border safety invoice to the Ukraine laws, and he didn’t go so far as McConnell in advising Johnson to easily move the Senate invoice. That “is straightforward for senators to say,” Cornyn mentioned, including that Johnson is “attempting to determine it out and I want him nicely.”
Johnson confronted a near-pile-on from high Democrats within the room on Tuesday, together with Biden, Senate Majority Chief Chuck Schumer, and Home Minority Chief Hakeem Jeffries — all of whom pushed for Ukraine as nicely. Schumer publicly famous that “McConnell was the lead speaker in saying we would have liked to do Ukraine” in the course of the assembly, describing it as among the many most “intense” discussions within the room.
“It was the consensus in that room Zelenskyy and Ukraine will lose the conflict” if the U.S. doesn’t present assist, Schumer additionally warned.
Whereas all 4 high leaders are actually in obvious lockstep about avoiding a authorities shutdown, Johnson remained noncommittal on an emergency overseas assist invoice, merely stating that lawmakers should prioritize the U.S. border earlier than serving to an ally abroad. He’s pushing Biden to make use of government actions to tighten safety on the southern border earlier than turning to Ukraine, and he’s not alone in that view.
“That may be the best way it will work if we did it, if the president would do these government actions,” mentioned Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), who aligns with Johnson on the border.
Johnson has beforehand pledged to get assist to Ukraine handed. However since then he has heard loud warnings from conservatives corresponding to Reps. Warren Davidson (R-Ohio) and Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) — together with threats of a vote to oust him as speaker — if he strikes ahead on such assist.
Finally, Johnson might watch a bunch of his personal centrists remedy the issue with out him. A number of Republicans are nonetheless open to becoming a member of fingers with Democrats to bypass the constrained speaker and move a separate Ukraine-border invoice.
McConnell, in the meantime, has taken arrows for pushing ahead on a border and overseas assist package deal that features funding for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) even known as for the Kentucky Republican to step down over the matter earlier this month, and conservative blanched at McConnell’s Ukraine advocacy on Tuesday.
“Who was standing up for the American taxpayer? Or for Individuals harmed by Biden’s open-border insurance policies?” mentioned Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) in
reaction to the meeting.
There’s extra daylight on the GOP’s funding technique between Johnson and McConnell, who mentioned Monday that Congress must go “towards clear appropriations and away from poison tablets.” Johnson and his Home allies are combating for conservative coverage restrictions in spending payments, which Democrats say they won’t settle for.
The primary likelihood of a partial shutdown hits this week with Friday’s funding deadline. Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.), who’s near Johnson, mentioned he was uncertain whether or not the speaker might muscle by means of a stopgap “persevering with decision” to keep away from a funding lapse — although it seems to be the one approach round a shutdown.
“I don’t see a number of coordination,” Kennedy mentioned of Home and Senate Republicans. “We might simply preserve doing these short-term [continuing resolutions] between now and the election.”
Johnson has pledged to honor the so-called 72-hour rule and provides his members time to evaluation any deal that’s secured. That leaves little or no time to cease a bunch of presidency businesses from operating out of cash on Saturday.
He additionally pledged to maintain attempting to move all 12 particular person spending payments, which has set the expectation that Johnson will preserve pushing the identical kind of stopgap spending patches he has promised to keep away from.
Finger-pointing between Schumer and Johnson is already underway as to who would shoulder the blame within the occasion of a shutdown. Importantly, although, Republicans have didn’t leverage shutdowns to get their demanded concessions over the past three many years.
That features former Speaker Newt Gingrich in 1995 attempting to unsuccessfully use a partial shutdown to get cuts from then-President Invoice Clinton. Extra not too long ago, former President Donald Trump didn’t extract cash for his border wall in 2018 after a shutdown dragged on for a document 35 days.
“It’s only a highway to nowhere at midnight,” mentioned Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) of a shutdown. “A distress march. No one wins.”
