White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre held a news conference after President Joe Biden signed into law a $95 billion war aid measure Wednesday that includes aid to Ukraine, in Israel and Taiwan and which also contains a provision that would force the social media site TikTok to be sold or banned in the United States
Watch the event in the player above.
This announcement marks the end of a long and painful battle with Republicans in Congress over urgent aid to Ukraine.
“We rose to the occasion, we came together and we got it done,” Biden said at a White House event to announce the signing. “Now we have to act quickly, and we are doing it. »
But significant damage has been done to the Biden administration’s efforts to help Ukraine repel the Russian invasion during the financial standoff dating back to August, when the Democratic president made his first spending request urgently for aid to Ukraine. Even with an explosion of new weapons and munitions, Ukraine is unlikely to recover immediately after months of setbacks.
Biden approved immediately sending $1 billion in military assistance to Ukraine and said the shipment would begin arriving in the “next few hours” – the first tranche of about $61 billion allocated to Ukraine. The package includes air defense capabilities, artillery shells, armored vehicles and other weapons to support Ukrainian forces whose morale has plummeted as Russian President Vladimir Putin has racked up victory after victory.
But longer term, it remains unclear whether Ukraine – after months of losses in the country’s east and massive damage to its infrastructure – can make enough progress to maintain US political support before spending the latest influx silver.
“This does not work in favor of the Ukrainians in Donbas, and certainly not elsewhere in the country,” said White House national security spokesman John Kirby, referring to the eastern industrial heartland where Ukraine suffered setbacks. “Mr. Putin thinks he can buy time. So we have to try to make up for some of that time.
The measure contains a provision that gives ByteDance, TikTok’s Beijing-based parent company, nine months to sell it or face a nationwide ban in the United States. The president can grant a one-time 90-day extension, bringing the sale deadline to one year, if he certifies that there is a path to divestiture and “significant progress” toward its implementation.
The administration and a bipartisan group of lawmakers have called the social media site a growing national security problem.
TikTok said it would take legal action against what it called an “unconstitutional” effort by Congress.
“We believe that the facts and the law are clearly on our side and that we will ultimately prevail,” the company said in a statement.
The bill also includes about $26 billion in aid to Israel and an increase of about $1 billion in humanitarian aid for Palestinians in Gaza who are suffering as the war between Israel and Hamas continues. Biden said Israel must ensure that humanitarian aid to the Palestinians in the bill reaches Gaza “without delay.”
House Speaker Mike Johnson delayed a vote on the additional aid package for months because far-right members of his party, including Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia and Thomas Massie of Kentucky, threatened to oust him if he allowed a vote to send more aid to Ukraine. These threats persist.
