OPINION:
House Speaker Mike Johnson is in a tight spot. With a single-vote majority, no matter what choice he makes about bankrolling Ukraine’s fight with Russia, he’s likely to spark an internal rebellion when Congress returns from vacation next week.
The Louisiana Republican floated a few ideas in an Easter Sunday interview with Fox News host Trey Gowdy. As Mr. Johnson explained, the best he can do under the circumstances is offer incremental progress.
“You gotta build consensus,” the speaker said. “If we want to move a partisan measure, I gotta have every single member — literally.”
Mr. Johnson isn’t falling for President Biden’s disingenuous $61 billion proposal wrapping Ukraine aid into a package that also provides some support for Israel, Taiwan, and our southern border. “They opened the border intentionally,” Mr. Johnson said.
Instead, he wants the so-called national security bill to have “important innovations” such as the REPO Act, which would effectively steal the property of Russian citizens and send it to Ukraine. “If we can use the seized assets of Russian oligarchs to allow the Ukrainians to fight them, that’s just pure poetry,” he said.
Of course, when countries such as Cuba and Venezuela seized U.S. property, the United States rightly retaliated. It’s hard to see how such a move wouldn’t be shortsighted, discouraging foreigners from ever trusting the United States with their assets.
Another option on the table is sending the cash to Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy and calling the handout a loan. “They can provide it back to us when the time is right,” said Mr. Johnson. We know how that will go.
Without any auditing of the funds already dispensed, there’s no way to know how many millions are already stashed in offshore accounts belonging to officials in a country that, before Russia invaded it, ranked near the bottom — not far from Russia — in Transparency International’s corruption index.
Perhaps the most promising idea the speaker is floating would leverage the Ukraine issue to cajole President Biden into repealing his ban on the export of our natural gas resources.
The left is reluctant to oblige because driving up the cost of fossil fuels is the key to making inefficient windmills and solar panels seem attractive. The administration’s energy policy only plays into the hands of Russia — the world’s No. 2 natural gas producer behind the United States. Reducing energy costs, on the other hand, is great for Americans and puts the squeeze on the primary source of capital for Vladimir Putin’s war machine.
Opponents of financing a conflict that has taken 70,000 Ukrainian lives would probably want to see a blueprint for how further assistance wouldn’t simply perpetuate the bloodshed for the benefit of defense contractors.
To hold together a party holding such divergent views, Mr. Johnson shouldn’t tie the vote to Israel or rebuilding Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge. Put Democrats in the hot seat by forcing them to choose between supporting Ukraine and reducing Mr. Putin’s energy profits or enhancing U.S. border security. After all, we shouldn’t invest in someone else’s border to the neglect of our own.
Stuck in a no-win situation, the speaker might find consensus if he can craft legislative language that moves the needle on illegal immigration and energy. Even the fiercest opponents of aid to Ukraine might take that deal.
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