Zelensky, Hungarians at D.C. To Sway Lawmakers on Ukraine Aid Ahead of Holiday Recess

With Congress expected to go home for the holidays on Thursday, President Zelensky and surrogates of Prime Minister Orbán of Hungary are at Washington D.C. seeking to influence lawmakers deciding on the future of American aid to Ukraine.Tomorrow, Mr. Zelensky is expected to meet in person with members of Congress and President Biden to plead for additional assistance in Ukraine’s defense against Russia.Today, representatives from the Hungarian Institute of International Affairs and staff from the Hungarian embassy are attending an event hosted by an influential conservative think tank, the Heritage Foundation, according to a report from the Guardian. Some Republican members of Congress are also expected to attend closed-door meetings at the event. The evolving split screen between Mr. Zelenky’s trip to Washington D.C. and surrogates for Mr. Orbán attending the Heritage Foundation event comes as Republicans in Congress are blocking aid to Ukraine.Mr. Obán and his administration have also opposed aid to Ukraine in other venues. In early December, Mr. Orbán posted a tweet opposing the addition of Ukraine to the European Union. Hungary has demanded that a measure to admit Ukraine to the union be taken off the European Council’s December schedule.Republicans in the Senate blocked an emergency spending bill aimed at funding Ukraine last week. Republican leadership in both the House and the Senate are pushing to tie aid to Ukraine to changes in American border policy.“The battle is for the border,” Speaker Johnson said at a press conference last week. “We do that first as a top priority, and we’ll take care of these other obligations.”While some Republicans are attempting to extract concessions from Democrats on border and immigration policy — such as limiting the number of asylum seekers allowed into America and resuming construction of a wall — others are opposed to sending more aid to Ukraine without America pushing for an end to the war.Senator Vance told CNN’s “State of the Union” that he thinks it’s now “in America’s best interest to accept [that] Ukraine is going to have to cede some territory to the Russians.”“The thing that’s in our interest and in theirs is to stop the killing,” Mr. Vance said. “The idea that Ukraine was going to throw Russia back to the 1991 border was preposterous; nobody actually believed it.”In an interview with Real America’s Voice, Mr. Vance elaborated on his position, saying that Mr. Zelensky is “parachuting into this domestic political debate about prioritizing our own border.”“He’s here to badger and browbeat Speaker Johnson and Senate Republicans into forgoing our negotiations on border security in order to write him another blank check,” Mr. Vance said. “This is literally a guy begging for a handout.”Senator McConnell has struck a different position on the issue, blaming Democrats for holding up aid to Ukraine in a speech on the floor of the Senate.“Apparently, some of our colleagues would rather let Russia trample a sovereign nation in Europe than do what it takes to enforce America’s own sovereign borders,” Mr. McConnell said. “They’re convinced open borders are worth jeopardizing security around the world.”Among Republican voters, 48 percent now say that America is providing too much aid to Ukraine, according to a December Pew Research survey. In June, 44 percent of Republican respondents said that America was providing too much aid.Republicans are more united on the border as an issue, according to a recent News Nation Decision Desk HQ poll. The survey found that border security was the top issue for 52 percent of respondents, while the next most popular top issue was keeping inflation in check at 29.8 percent.Mr. Biden has also criticized Republicans for their position on Ukraine, saying at a press conference that Republicans are “willing to literally kneecap Ukraine on the battlefield and damage our national security in the process.”“Make no mistake: Today’s vote’s going to be long remembered, and history is going to judge harshly those who turned their backs on freedom’s cause,” Mr. Biden said.Other Democrats, like Senator Murphy, have said that the GOP’s demands were “unreasonable,” suggesting that a deal on Ukraine aid may be unlikely to emerge before lawmakers are expected to go home on Thursday.“If I were a cynic, I would say that Republicans have decided to tie support for Ukraine to immigration reform because they want Ukraine aid to fail,” Mr. Murphy told NBC on Sunday. “But I’m not a cynic.”

Zelensky, Hungarians at D.C. To Sway Lawmakers on Ukraine Aid Ahead of Holiday Recess

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