Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy used his trip to Israel to cast his full-throated support behind security aid to Ukraine, months after insisting the country would not get a "blank check" from Congress.
“I vote for aid for Ukraine. I support aid for Ukraine,” McCarthy said, responding to a question from a Russian reporter.
“I do not support what your country has done to Ukraine, I do not support your killing of the children either,” McCarthy told a Russian reporter there, adding. “You should pull out.”
According to Politico, the speaker also vowed to continue giving weapons and military assistance" as long as I am Speaker" during his landmark speech to the Knesset (he's only the second Speaker to address Israel's legislative body since Newt Gingrich in 1998).
This is a bit of a shift in tone for the Republican leader, at least since October when his party was embroiled in a tight race for dominance in the 2022 elections and inflation was the hot topic. “I think people are gonna be sitting in a recession and they’re not going to write a blank check to Ukraine,” McCarthy told Punchbowl News at the time. “They just won’t do it. … It’s not a free blank check.”
He doubled down on the statement in March when he declined an invitation by Ukrainian president Zelensky to visit Kyiv.
“Let’s be very clear about what I said: no blank checks, OK? So, from that perspective, I don’t have to go to Ukraine to understand where there’s a blank check or not,” McCarthy said. “I will continue to get my briefings and others, but I don’t have to go to Ukraine or Kyiv to see it.”
McCarthy and Zelensky ultimately spoke on the phone.
But McCarthy's seeming shift comes two weeks after a group of 19 Republicans sent a letter to President Biden saying they would no longer support unconditional aid to Ukraine and that future packages would have to come with a clear strategy for ending the war.
According to Axios, the next aid package could come this summer, setting up a fight amid Republicans, though despite McCarthy's heavy-handed words back in October and March (and oversight efforts by Rep Matt Gaetz and Sen. J.D. Vance), "the issue has barely been on the House agenda."
While the latest polls definitely indicate Republican voters going one way on the subject (more skeptical of aid), it would seem the party establishment is not interested in rocking the boat, at least not yet.
