Aid to Ukraine and Israel in doubt as House speaker says he won’t support deal

The prospects for the US Congress approving new aid to Ukraine as well as military assistance to Israel worsened on Friday after the Republican speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, said he was unlikely to support a deal under negotiation in the Senate that is considered crucial to unlocking the funds.

A bipartisan group of senators have for weeks been looking for an agreement to implement stricter immigration policies and curtail migrant arrivals at the southern border with Mexico, which have surged during Joe Biden’s presidency. Republicans have named passing that legislation as their price for approving aid to Ukraine, whose cause rightwing lawmakers have soured on as the war has dragged on and Donald Trump, who has been ambivalent about sending arms to Kyiv, draws closer to winning the Republican presidential nomination.

While the precise details of the immigration bargain have yet to be released, Johnson told his Republican colleagues in a letter that “if rumors about the contents of the draft proposal are true, it would have been dead on arrival in the House anyway”.

Underscoring his stridency on the topic, Johnson reiterated his demand that the Democratic-controlled Senate vote on the Secure the Border Act, a hardline proposal that would essentially resurrect Trump’s immigration policy by restarting construction of a wall on the border with Mexico and forcing asylum seekers to wait in that country while their claim is processed.

He also announced the chamber would move ahead with its plan to impeach the homeland security secretary, Alejandro Mayorkas, whom Republicans have accused of mishandling border security.

“When we return next week, by necessity, the House Homeland Security Committee will move forward with Articles