U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson is likely introducing a Ukraine aid bill after Easter, facing potential challenges due to internal party dynamics.
U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson is likely introducing a Ukraine aid bill after Easter, facing potential challenges due to internal party dynamics.
No.
The 2022 bill was passed by the 117th Congress in May 2022.
https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-bill/7691
The current one has been banging around since late 2023 and is the 118th Congress:
https://www.congress.gov/bill/118th-congress/house-bill/5692
The 118th is split very closely between the Republicans and Democrats, with R having a very slight majority, which means that a very small number who wants to play hardball with their party leadership on the R side can block bills. And so that’s been happening on various bills.
In theory, a Speaker could pass a bill by relying on at least some Democrat support and ignoring said small number of people playing chicken, but Kevin McCarthy, the previous Speaker, did exactly that and then the Democrats refused to support him when the backlash on his side of the aisle came up, meaning that he lost his seat when one of the people on the R side moved to vacate his seat. That kind of set the stage to kill bipartisanship from the current Speaker, Mike Johnson.
EDIT: Okay, to clarify, the latter bill was an attempt at passing Ukraine aid in the House, months back. It won’t be the one that goes through now; there was subsequently a Senate-initiated bill, and then Johnson may do a House bill.
It sucks that the Democrats could have partially prevented this and kept bipartisanship alive by handing McCarthy a proverbial olive branch, but didn’t. Although I get that watching the Republicans squabble over who will be speaker probably helped their image at the time.