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WASHINGTON – The House failed to pass more than $17.6 billion in aid to Israel on Tuesday. This is a blow to House Speaker Mike Johnson’s attempt to override the Senate’s broad bipartisan agreement linking foreign aid to border and immigration policy changes.
The bill failed by a vote of 250 to 180. The bill faced fierce opposition from multiple quarters in the House and required significant bipartisan support as Republican leadership put the bill on hold. This is a procedural tactic that speeds up the vote on the bill, but requires two-thirds support for passage.
Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have long called for additional aid to Israel as the war with Hamas escalates in the Middle East. But some House Republicans and Democrats, as well as some senators, remain concerned about the push.
Many progressives who voted against the bill cited Israel’s continued attacks in the Gaza Strip and called for stronger human rights protections in the region. Other Democrats voted against the bill in favor of a bipartisan package that included aid to Ukraine. Far-right conservatives, meanwhile, rejected the bill because it did not include specific provisions to disburse billions of dollars in aid.
House Democratic leaders also called the bill “possible a comprehensive bipartisan funding package to address America’s national security challenges in the Middle East, Ukraine, and the Indo-Pacific region” in a letter to lawmakers on Tuesday. “An attempt to undermine sexuality.” All over the world. “
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But this isn’t the first time members of Congress have tried to pass aid to Israel under controversial circumstances. The House passed a bill last year largely along party lines to send $14.3 billion to Israel. But it included a provision that would remove funding from the Internal Revenue Service to pay for the aid, which Democrats quickly rejected.
Johnson announced the latest aid bill for Israel a day before a cross-party group of senators announced a deal linking foreign aid to countries including Israel and Ukraine with changes to border and immigration policies. Johnson and his House Republican leadership nearly scrapped the deal, which was four months in the making, saying it didn’t do enough to address the crisis at the southern border.
The White House, which has supported the Senate border deal, also threatened to veto the House Israel bill if it reaches Biden’s desk and is dismissed as “cynical political maneuvering.”
“Israel’s security should be sacrosanct, not a political game. We have done nothing to secure our borders, and we have done nothing to protect the Ukrainian people from Putin’s aggression. “We strongly oppose this move, which is useless and denies humanitarian assistance to Palestinian civilians, the majority of whom are women and children. Palestinians supported this by opening Palestine,” the White House said. Secretary of State Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement over the weekend.
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