Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina mentioned on Sunday that he wouldn’t assist a request from President Biden to package deal help for Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan and funding for border safety, though he has endorsed U.S. spending for every of these functions.
“I consider that leveraging the challenges within the warfare with Israel to get extra help for Ukraine at that degree of $60 billion is an excessive amount of, and we have to have a single concentrate on bringing Congress collectively behind the assist for Israel,” Mr. Scott, a 2024 Republican candidate, mentioned on “This Week” on ABC News.
At first, he indicated that his objection was primarily to the opportunity of delaying help to Israel by combining it with funding on which Congress is extra divided. He mentioned that he believed help to Israel alone “would go in a single day,” and {that a} “splintered” package deal could be more durable to go.
However when the interviewer, Jonathan Karl, requested whether or not he would really vote towards the package deal if it got here to the Senate flooring, Mr. Scott mentioned he would.
“I’ll within the present assemble,” he mentioned, including {that a} “longer course of” was wanted to debate how a lot help to ship to Ukraine. “Israel is initially of a protracted, protracted warfare,” he mentioned. “I feel we’re a lot better off, higher served as a nation, focusing our assets and our consideration instantly on Israel, and persevering with to offer the sort of degree of accountability and duty the American individuals need to see because it pertains to the assets for Ukraine.”
His marketing campaign didn’t elaborate on his feedback, and pointed to a CNN interview wherein he mentioned largely the identical factor, criticizing the package deal for together with “extra money for Ukraine than it does for Israel.”
The request that Mr. Biden submitted to Congress on Friday included about $61 billion for Ukraine; $14 billion for Israel; $7 billion for Taiwan and different Indo-Pacific allies; $9 billion for humanitarian help in Ukraine, Israel and Gaza; and $14 billion for border safety in the US.
Mr. Scott shouldn’t be the one Republican to object to placing these items in a single package deal, an effort by the Biden administration to strain lawmakers who oppose funding Ukraine to assist the proposal within the curiosity of funding Israel, and vice versa.
Vivek Ramaswamy, one other Republican presidential candidate, denounced the proposal at a campaign event in Iowa on Saturday. Mr. Ramaswamy has lengthy opposed help to Ukraine, and he mentioned on the occasion that Israel’s navy aims in Gaza have been unclear and that serving to Israel would danger a broader battle within the Center East.
However Mr. Scott’s rejection of the package deal is notable as a result of he’s on the report as supporting each part.
He has been one of the most outspoken Republican candidates in favor of serving to Ukraine repel Russia’s invasion: He accused Mr. Biden final 12 months of “ready too lengthy to offer too little assist,” and he has described a Ukrainian victory as a matter of American curiosity, arguing that it will discourage a Russian incursion into NATO territory that might pull the US right into a wider warfare. He has endorsed sending weapons to Taiwan. And, in the identical interview on Sunday wherein he rejected the package deal, he referred to as for funding to safe the southern border of the US.
Virtually the entire Republican presidential field has endorsed navy help to Israel, however the candidates are divided on aid to Ukraine: Along with Mr. Ramaswamy, former President Donald J. Trump and Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida have mentioned they need to lower it. Just a few, although, have voiced their positions on Mr. Biden’s proposal.
Amongst them is former Vice President Mike Pence, who advised NBC Information on Sunday that he supported help for Israel and Ukraine “collectively or individually.”
