Speaker McCarthy backtracks on removing Ukraine funding from Pentagon spending package

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said Saturday he will not remove funding for Ukraine from a Pentagon spending package, contradicting his stance from the day before. 

McCarthy told reporters at the Capitol that he made the decision to keep the $300 million of Ukraine aid in the bill after recognizing that another spending measure set to come up next week that funds the State Department and Foreign Operations, also includes funds for Ukraine, according to The Hill. 

The package has already twice failed in a procedural vote due to internal Republican opposition.

McCarthy explained that removing the Ukraine aid out of the State Department and Foreign Operations measure would be difficult.

The House next week is supposed to vote on a single procedural vote to advance four appropriations bills that include certain measures that fund the Pentagon and the State Department and Foreign Operations. 

“That’s not solving it because one of the others has some Ukraine things,” McCarthy said, regarding taking the Ukraine aid out of the Pentagon appropriations bill. “So it became too difficult to do that so we’re leaving it in.”

He also added that he expects Georgia GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene to vote against it, even though she has become an ally of the Speaker. 

“I think she’ll vote no on the rule if it’s in there, that’s why I was trying to solve it where everybody could be there,” McCarthy said. “But this one, it didn’t work out.”

"I was trying to find a way to solve the problem, that if we were just voting on the DoD approps bill I think I could have solved that, this one makes it a little more difficult,” added McCarthy.

Charlotte Hazard is a reporter at Just the News. Follow her on X.