Russia-Ukraine war news: Biden, GOP lawmakers press for Ukraine aid after Congress leaves it out of funding bill

Republican lawmakers also said Ukraine would receive aid in the coming weeks, though they said it would need to be packaged with spending on U.S. border security.

Ukrainian officials sought to minimize the snub, though some observers worried that support could be waning.

Here’s the latest on the war and its ripple effects around the globe.

Biden said he expected House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) to support funding for Ukrainians “as they defend themselves against aggression and brutality.” Biden touted “overwhelming” bipartisan support for Ukrainian aid, and he said he hoped Republican leaders would “keep their word” on further funding it.

McCarthy said he’ll support sending Ukrainian troops “the weapons that they need,” though a potential challenge to his leadership could further complicate plans for the aid. McCarthy, speaking on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” said he wanted to include efforts for U.S. border control in the next Ukraine-aid legislation.

Sen. Lindsey O. Graham said Sunday morning that Senate Republicans would soon come out with a bill that would provide as much as $70 billion for Ukraine. “I’m not worried about the next six weeks,” Graham (R-S.C.) said on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” referring to the time period covered by the short-term spending bill passed this weekend. “I’m worried about next year. We will produce in the United States Senate Ukraine funding $60 or $70 billion … to get them through next year.” Graham also tied the next potential Ukraine aid to border funding.

Ukraine’s envoy to Washington expressed optimism that funding guarantees for Kyiv would be secured. There is time, there are resources, and there is bipartisan support for Ukraine in Washington, Ambassador Oksana Markarova said in a Facebook post. An adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky expressed confidence in U.S. aid Saturday. There has been no change in U.S. support, Andriy Yermak said on Telegram before the Senate vote, and Ukrainian leaders discuss the support often with Democratic and Republican officials.

Aid for Ukraine had been a key issue as the United States headed toward a potential government shutdown. House Republicans, with late help from Democrats, pushed through a short-term bill to fund the government through Nov. 17 and avert a shutdown. Though the Senate ultimately approved the bill as well, the vote was at first delayed by Sen. Michael F. Bennet (D-Colo.), who expressed concern over the lack of additional aid to Ukraine.

Slovakia’s parliamentary election has the potential to complicate the Western response to Ukraine. Nearly complete results showed that Robert Fico, a populist former prime minister whose campaign has been laced with pro-Russian and anti-American discourse, defeated his progressive rival. Fico said Sunday that his party would do “everything we can” to promote immediate Ukraine-Russia peace talks. Zelensky has said he would allow peace talks only once Russian troops have left Ukraine; the Kremlin has said it must hold on to the five areas it has illegally annexed since 2014.

Drones were spotted above Russian regions overnight into Sunday morning, local authorities said. Flights into Sochi International Airport were temporarily redirected as a result, the Black Sea resort city’s mayor, Alexei Kopaigorodsky, said early Sunday — adding in a Telegram post that a drone was shot down. Farther north, the governor of Smolensk region, bordering Belarus, said three drones were suppressed.

NATO jets are monitoring part of its eastern flank “in the wake of Russian drone strikes near NATO territory,” the defense alliance said. NATO’s X account said Sunday that Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) surveillance jets that arrived in Siauliai, Lithuania, last week “can detect aircraft and missiles hundreds of kilometres away.” Romania detected “a possible unauthorized” breach of the its airspace, the Defense Ministry said Saturday. In a separate instance a few weeks earlier, it said it found fragments of a suspected Russian drone in Romania.

Ukrainian officials accused Russia of attacking civilian infrastructure overnight. In Ukraine’s central Cherkasy region, regional governor Ihor Taburets said a drone attack ignited a fire in a grain warehouse in the city of Uman and injured one person. In the Dnipropetrovsk region, a drone targeted civilian infrastructure in the city of Kryvyi Rih, and a power line and gas pipeline were shelled by artillery in Nikopol, local military administrator Serhiy Lysak said.

A 63-year-old resident died riding a bicycle in Vovchansk, in the Kharkiv region, after Russian forces shelled the city center, according to the local prosecutor’s office. In the city of Kharkiv, three missiles hit civilian infrastructure, starting a fire, regional administration head Oleh Synyehubov said on Telegram on Sunday. Ukrainian state media also reported the sound of explosions over Zaporizhzhia.

A new round of Russian military conscription was slated to start Sunday, and it is expected to call up about 130,000 people, the country’s Defense Ministry said. It claimed that the conscription was not connected to the war in Ukraine. All men in Russia are required to serve in the military or perform equivalent training in higher education for at least one year between the ages of 18 and 27.

British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said there were no plans to deploy British forces to Ukraine, after Defense Secretary Grant Shapps suggested the country could send military trainers there. In an interview with Sky News Sunday, Sunak said “there are no British soldiers that will be sent to fight in the current conflict.” Earlier this weekend, Shapps told the Telegraph that he was considering allowing trainers “into Ukraine” rather than relegating them to NATO bases outside the country. Dmitry Medvedev, deputy chairman of the Russian Security Council, said on X that such troops would be “ruthlessly eliminated” and considered representatives of NATO.

The United States is the biggest financial supporter of Kyiv’s fight against Russia: Washington has committed more than $60 billion in aid to Ukraine since the beginning of Russia’s invasion in February 2022, including more than $43 billion in military aid, Ruby Mellen and Artur Galocha report in a visual look at U.S. spending during the war.

“These are off-the-charts numbers,” said Michael O’Hanlon, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. He likened the figures to U.S. commitments to European countries at the end of World War II. The Marshall Plan, when adjusted for inflation, came to about $150 billion over three years.

More than a year and a half into the conflict, U.S. public support for Ukraine funding is wavering, particularly among Republicans. Lately, some hard-right GOP members of the House have opposed sending more aid to Ukraine and made it a central issue in negotiations over a U.S. government spending bill.

Natalia Abbakumova, Mariana Alfaro, Jacob Bogage, Ellen Francis, John Hudson, Kostiantyn Khudov, Patrick Marley, Justine McDaniel, Serhiy Morgunov, Jeff Stein and David Stern contributed to this report.