The Senate’s top appropriator for foreign aid on Friday said he sees strong bipartisan support for passing an emergency spending bill totaling $10 billion or more to address dire needs stemming from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Speaking to reporters after his return from a weeklong trip to Germany, Poland and Lithuania, Senate State-Foreign Operations Appropriations Chairman Chris Coons, D-Del., listed the many needs he sees that are not accounted for in fiscal 2022 funding levels still being negotiated by lawmakers.
Those needs include more security assistance for Ukraine and other Eastern European countries worried that Russia might attack them; higher military costs to account for the just-announced deployment of 7,000 U.S. troops to Europe; an expected “millions” of refugees who are likely to flee Ukraine for Poland and other Eastern European countries in the coming weeks and months; and higher funding support for the Treasury Department in order to implement and enforce the slew of new sanctions on Russia’s economy that President Joe Biden announced this week.
