(TotalConservative.com) – Rep. Dan Meuser (R-PA) expressed his belief that it was “far more important” to fund Israel than the IRS on Tuesday, October 31st. He called the need for military equipment an “urgent emergency” on “Wake Up America.” He did not feel the same about Ukraine, suggesting that coupling the two conflicts is a “non-starter” for him.
Meuser also called the idea of leveraging the emergency to get additional funding for Ukraine “a little outrageous.” President Joe Biden’s budget request featured multiple line items, but the bulk of the $105 billion request was $60 billion for Ukraine. It also granted $14.3 to Israel and allocated the remainder toward beefing Taiwan against China and protecting the southern border and U.S. bases around the world.
Republicans in Congress are attempting to separate and parse the items so they can be voted upon individually. This has been a recurring complaint from conservative Republicans in the past, with Senator Rand Paul being a particularly vocal critic of the practice. Meuser defended a new bill that allocates funding for Israel specifically.
Meuser said he was also in favor of funding Ukraine, but that the “taxpayer deserves transparency” for every penny. He also expressed his support for newly elected Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA). Meuser explained that a stand-alone bill will have a strong uphill battle in the Senate as well as gaining the approval of President Joe Biden.
The White House went as far as to declare that a veto would be forthcoming should the bill land on Biden’s desk on Tuesday, October 31st. Biden had subordinates at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) attack the bill as “bad for Israel” and the entire region, while invoking nebulous threats to national security. They also called the move partisan and criticized its failure to include humanitarian support for Gaza, Ukraine, and “allies in the Indo-Pacific.”
OMB complained that the split “would have global consequences” without specifically citing reasons why these things can’t be separated and voted on individually.
Meuser further criticized Biden’s State Department for failing to set up humanitarian corridors for refugees seeking to escape the fighting. Rep. Cory Mills (R-FL) also criticized the State Department for failing to evacuate Americans stranded in Israel. Mills has helped evacuate over 200 Americans stuck in Israel since the conflict began on October 7th.
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