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Factbox: When is the first Republican primary debate? Who will be there? - Reuters
West Wing aides have noted that public support goes up for Ukraine funding any time there is a major moment in the conflict. They plan to take advantage of a pair of upcoming international appearances by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to keep the pressure on Republicans. Zelenskyy is expected to attend next months G-20 summit meeting in India before returning to the United States to deliver a speech to the U.N. General Assembly.
The White House will also ramp up public pressure by hammering home the need to defend democracies around the globe as well as the fiscal necessity to thwart Russia or any future nation with war ambitions by pointing out the negative economic impact of the war.
The defense assistance that both parties have come together around has been critical to Ukraines ability to beat back Russias illegal invasion and to strengthening our alliances in the world, said White House spokesperson Andrew Bates.
The president has been very clear that this strategy deters wars of choice and the economic disruption they cause and that we will continue to support Ukraine and our own basic principles as a country, he said.
But the funding battle is poised to lead to another standoff between the president and Speaker Kevin McCarthy, one that could shape Bidens legacy and Ukraines success in the war.
Biden has placed the defense of Ukraine against Russias invasion at the center of his foreign policy, rallying the democracies of the world to help one of their own. The U.S. has spearheaded the effort, corralling NATO and other allies to send billions in military and economic aid. But the jubilation is giving way to fear as Ukraines wartime success stalls.
Kyivs counteroffensive, purposefully slow to preserve troops and weapons as they wade through minefields and operate without air cover, has helped its forces advance foot-by-foot along the 600-mile front with dug-in Russian forces. But that slow pace has led senior U.S. officials to admit they dont know how to judge the progress.
The tactics clearly dont make good politics. Polls suggest Americans are growing weary of supporting Ukraines battlefield stalemate, and Republicans are seizing on what they see as an opportunity.
The funding path should be easier in the Senate than the House since Ukraine has been championed by several Republicans, most notably Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. McConnell views support for Ukraine as a piece of his legacy and the West Wing believes he will keep his side largely in line and, importantly, set a tone for the House talks. But a worsening of the 81-year-old senators recent health challenges could upend the calculations.
Still, the Senate will want to put their fingerprints on any spending bill especially after the way the Senate got jammed by the House on the debt ceiling agreement. When the White House sent its funding request last week, the top Republican and Democratic appropriators indicated they would write their own legislation.
For now, McCarthy looms as the White Houses most significant obstacle. He has at times been in the thrall of his partys far right, which has called for slashing money being sent to the war zone.
Former President Donald Trump, the prohibitive favorite to become the GOP presidential nominee, has questioned the need to back Ukraine and repeated a desire to broker a peace deal with Russia quickly. Officials on both sides of the Atlantic assess that Russian President Vladimir Putin is trying to wait out the upcoming U.S. election, believing that his fortunes in the war could change if a Republican commands from the Oval Office.
For now, Speaker Kevin McCarthy looms as the White Houses most significant obstacle. He has at times been in the thrall of his partys far right, which has called for slashing money being sent to the war zone. | Francis Chung/POLITICO
Even pro-Ukraine Republicans are hedging against supporting a new deal for Ukraine. Rep. Andy Harris (R-Md.), the House Freedom Caucus sole Kyiv-friendly member, said this week that Ukraine cant win the war and, therefore, the U.S. should reconsider further stocking its defenses.
Its not just far-right members, said a House Republican aide granted anonymity to speak freely. [Mainstream Republicans are] sympathetic to the cause but were throwing money at a conflict that can last for years.
McCarthys office did not return multiple requests for comment.
Financial support for Ukraine, for the most part, still enjoys bipartisan backing. But there is long-running skepticism among House Republicans about continuing to fund the war in Ukraine, and its unclear if McCarthy wants to defy them to strike another spending deal with Biden. White House aides and Democratic congressional negotiators expect that the speaker, in order to appease the hard right, will push to make some cuts and could threaten at any point to blow up the package.
Republicans may also ask, according to those close to the process, for some sort of inspector to monitor Ukraine funding to ward off corruption.
But Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.), a staunch Ukraine supporter and McCarthy ally, said he would only support a Ukraine package that ensures advanced weapons like the long-range Army Tactical Missile System make it to the battlefield. Without that assurance, he sees no point in further depleting U.S. stocks and spending more money to keep Ukraine at a fighting stalemate with Russia.
Why keep giving Ukraine weapons that dont help them win the war? the House Armed Services Committee member said in an interview. I dont want to give more for a gridlock.
Far-right Republicans are likely to weaponize the domestic-foreign imbalance in the White Houses spending request: $40 billion total, including $24 billion in Ukraine. The emergency supplemental request will bump up against what is expected to be a continuing resolution to keep the government funded for a short, yet-to-be-determined amount of time another measure unpopular with conservatives.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer argues that consensus is possible.
This is not just Democrats. This is not just Joe Biden. The vast majority of the Republican caucus in the Senate and the Republican leader saying we need this supplemental, and we need it for we need it for Ukraine, Schumer said. And I am hopeful that the House will do that.
Congress has already approved $113 billion in aid for Ukraine including around $70 billion for security assistance; more than 90 percent of it has already been spent or assigned. The new request includes $13.1 billion for military aid to Ukraine and replenishment of Pentagon weapons supplies that have been used for the war effort. An additional $8.5 billion would go for economic, humanitarian and other assistance to Kyiv and other nations affected by the war, while $2.3 billion would be used in an effort to leverage more aid from other donors through the World Bank.
But the chorus of Washington voices who think enough is enough has grown louder.
The United States current level of support for Ukraine is unsustainable militarily, financially and increasingly politically, said Dan Caldwell, vice president for the Center for Renewing America, who with his colleagues is lobbying House Republicans to oppose the Ukraine spending request.
Proponents argue the need for new funds is urgent. The money Congress initially approved is now down to the single digits at an estimated $6 billion. Its enough to further provide Ukraine with munitions for Patriot air-defense systems, 155 mm artillery rounds, Javelin anti-tank missiles and spare parts to fix broken-down equipment. U.S. officials say its not sufficient, even as the Pentagon finds more dollars in the proverbial couch, to sustain Ukraine for the long haul.
Its important that we put the national interest here first and that [McCarthy] not continue to be led around by the nose by his farthest right and most extreme members, said Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.). I am confident that at the end of the day well get something through. I think theres going to be a lot of I think therell be some bumps along the way.
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House Republicans are standing between Biden and his war to save Ukraine - POLITICO
The latest indictment of former President Trump, in Georgia, differs from the other three cases he faces in one key respect.
The case brought by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis (D) shines a light on the role Republican officials played in pushing back on Trump’s false claims of election fraud and thwarting his plans to overturn the result.
This alone greatly complicates Trump’s preferred narrative, whereby he is the put-upon victim of President Biden and Democrats as he seeks to regain the White House. The former president labeled the indictments against him “election interference” in three social media posts Friday.
Such claims sit uneasily with the resistance he encountered in Georgia from Republican figures like Gov. Brian Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger.
As Trump again stokes fictions about fraud in the aftermath of the indictment, Kemp has again become an important opponent.
The Georgia governor has left virtually no doubt that he is skeptical about the former president’s 2024 candidacy, which is animated in large part by grievances about the 2020 defeat.
On Friday, Kemp told a conservative gathering in Atlanta, “It should be such an easy path for us [the Republican Party] to win the White House back but … We have to be focused on the future, not something that happened three years ago.”
Earlier in the week, Trump took to Truth Social to promote a press conference that he contended would provide “irrefutable” evidence of the “Presidential Election Fraud which took place in Georgia.”
Kemp promptly shot back on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter: “The 2020 election in Georgia was not stolen. For nearly three years now, anyone with evidence of fraud has failed to come forward — under oath — and prove anything in a court of law,” he wrote.
Kemp added, “The future of our country is at stake in 2024 and that must be our focus.”
Trump later canceled his proposed press conference, contending that his lawyers would “prefer putting this … in formal Legal Filings.”
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The Memo: Georgia indictment reminds voters of the Republicans who stood up to Trump - The Hill
If he can make it there, hell make it everywhere. Photo: Scott Olson/Getty Images
Among the Republicans who are scheming to prevent Donald Trumps third straight presidential nomination, there seems to be a notion that if the GOP presidential field him can be winnowed in Iowa and New Hampshire, some savior of the party will emerge and beat him in a one-on-one fight. The argument seems to go back to a highly debatable (Id actually call it wrong) proposition: The large field of rivals was the crucial factor in enabling Trump to win his first nomination in 2016. But even if it were true that a smaller field could have vanquished Trump in 2016, hes arguably a much stronger candidate right now than he was eight years ago. For example: Hes currently at 55.8 percent among Republican voters nationally in the RealClearPolitics polling averages. In 2016, he did not hit 50 percent in any national poll prior to nailing down the nomination in May.
Still, some say we should ignore the national polls and just focus on the early state races that could produce a Trump-vanquishing champion. Thats exactly what New Hampshire governor Chris Sununu argued Monday in a New York Times op-ed:
The best indicator of Mr. Trumps strength is looking to where the voters are paying attention: in states where candidates are campaigning, television ads are running, and there is a wide range of media attention on every candidate.
In Iowa and New Hampshire, the first two states that will vote in the 2024 Republican primaries, Mr. Trump is struggling. In both Iowa and New Hampshire, he is consistently polling in the low 40 percent range. The floor of his support may be high, but his ceiling is low.
I wouldnt call a candidate who has a 26-point lead in Iowa (again, per the RCP averages) and a 30-point lead in New Hampshire one who is struggling in those two states. Sununu appears to assume anyone who is not for Trump now will never support him, which wasnt true in 2016 (when he gained strength every time a rival dropped out) and isnt much supported by the evidence of Trumps high favorability numbers among Republicans today.
At some early point, if Trump keeps winning big, hes going to become unbeatable. No Republican candidate who has won both Iowa and New Hampshire has ever been denied the presidential nomination. Will Trump be the first? It sure sounds like another of those Establishment Republican fantasies whereby Trump is regularly underestimated.
Indeed, the bigger question about the early states in 2024 is whether Trump will have nailed down the nomination before the field is small enough to give anyone a clean shot at the heavy front-runner. Several candidates (notably Chris Christie and Vivek Ramaswamy) are focusing mostly on New Hampshire; they arent going to drop out after an underwhelming performance in Iowa. Tim Scott and Nikki Haley are likely to hang onto their candidacies fanatically until their home state of South Carolina the fourth state to vote holds its primary in late February.
Even without the post-Iowa winnowing Sununu is counting on, its true there is a history of New Hampshire voters interrupting the premature victory celebrations of Iowa winners in both parties. Is it possible an Iowa win by Trump would be Pyrrhic, dooming his candidacy?
That doesnt make a whole lot of sense once you examine the recent Republican candidates who have won Iowa and then quickly succumbed in New Hampshire and beyond. In 2008, 2012, and 2016, Iowa was won by Mike Huckabee, Rick Santorum, and Ted Cruz, respectively. Huckabee barely had two nickels to rub together; Santorum and Cruz upset national front-runners (Mitt Romney and Donald Trump) who came back to crush them in New Hampshire and later primaries. None of these doomed Iowa winners are in anything like the position Trump is in right now.
Sure, anythings possible in politics, and Trumps legal troubles could in theory extend the contest for the nomination even if hes winning intially (though so far those legal troubles seem to be helping him among Republicans). Candidates should definitely plan beyond the earliest states even if they are unlikely to be around for, say, Florida (where Trump and DeSantis could wage a dual home-turf battle ) or Georgia (where Trumps rivals are angling for an endorsement by Trumps nemesis Brian Kemp).
But the odds say Trumps rivals better beat him or at least give him a scare in Iowa, where its possible to punch above your weight with a superior ground game and where the 45th president has already lost once before. If he romps there, hes probably ne all but a lock for the nomination, barring crazy developments. And all those pleas to candidates to get out of the way of a fictional Trump-slayer will represent a waste of time and energy.
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Iowa Caucus Could Be Republicans' Only Chance to Stop Trump - New York Magazine
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Theres been a mounting chorus in recent weeks that Biden could have helped end the war in Ukraine months ago. Fred Kaplan explains where the criticism is coming from, why its wrong, and what the real question is instead.
Yes, we are aware that it is actually Monday, and therefore the opposite of the freakin weekend. But Slate has launched a new collection of weekend stories that are too much fun not to tell you about. In addition to Human Guinea Pig and Explainer, this weekend we launched One Thingshort pieces that explain one thing that could improve your life.
For example:
Get rid of your books!
Have a secret handshake with your kid
Make a better salad (OK, any salad)
Conquer your to-do list with one easy trick (basically!)
Check back next weekend for more!
Relatedly, were also running a column called What Its Likeexploring experiences that you probably havent had, but might be curious about. First up? Whats it like to be a process serveri.e., the guy in TV shows who is always tracking people down to tell them theyre being sued. Its more complicated than it sounds.
much like low-stakes flirting, which Luke Winkie was not permitted to do for an entire week, as he attempted to live like Mike Pence (never be alone with a woman who was not his partner). This is what the aforementioned Human Guinea Pig is all about, people!
Thanks so much for reading, and well see you tomorrow!
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Abortion after Roe v. Wade: How Republicans are still trying to get ... - Slate