U.S. senator is blocking assistance provision to Ukraine

A Senator of the United States Congress is blocking the allocation of funds to assist Ukraine.

Interfax-Ukraine reports about this with reference to Bloomberg.

Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul is blocking the quick passage of a bill to provide an additional $40 billion to help Ukraine.

“Rand Paul just unilaterally blocked swift passage of Ukraine aid. He wanted the rest of the Senate add language to the bill he plans to vote against anyway bc debt/inflation,” wrote Steven Dennis, the agency’s journalist on his Twitter.

Randy Paul’s position means that the bill will probably be eventually adopted t, but not as quickly as initially planned. Senators will first have to consider Paul’s proposals and vote on them.

“If such a gift is given to Ukraine, the total amount of our aid to this country will be equal to Russia’s military budget, this money is not coming out of nowhere, we will have to borrow it from China, and then send it to Ukraine,” said Senator Paul, whose speech was broadcasted by C-SPAN.

Consideration of proposals is expected after Senate comes back from the break in a few days.

Thus, the final vote will take place next week, or maybe later.

In addition, if the text of the bill is changed at the request of Paul, the document in its final form will be sent for reconsideration to the House of Representatives, which will also delay the decision.

On Tuesday, May 10, the U.S. House of Representatives approved over $40 billion in additional aid for Ukraine.

The document was developed in response to Russia’s aggression against Ukraine.

Two weeks ago, President Joe Biden asked Congress to approve an additional $33 billion in aid to Ukraine, but legislators decided to increase this military and humanitarian funding.