United States finds new source of financial aid for Ukraine

President Joe Biden's administration is seeking funding for Ukraine outside the US budget because the financial aid will last for a month at most if assistance is extended through Congress.

In the conditions of a limited US budget, the Biden administration is studying and implementing unusual ways to achieve its goals in Ukraine without the approval of the Capitol, Rubryka reports, referring to AXIOS.

It is clear to Biden officials that their ability to provide aid to Ukraine and Israel and finance the government is limited.

"There is no gigantic set of resources that we don't need Congress to do," Finance Secretary Yellen told the New York Times last week.

Getting out of position

US allies depend on military aid to fight wars in both Europe and the Middle East. The US government itself, in this mode, is threatened with a shutdown in a month.

A US official says that Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen plans to urge European officials in Luxembourg this week to take concrete steps to recover interest earned on some $200 billion in Russian assets held in European accounts.

Politico reports that the Biden administration is also considering using an existing State Department grant program to help Ukraine purchase weapons.

This week, the administration is preparing to send a new spending request to Congress, asking for more money for border security, Ukraine, Israel, and possibly Taiwan.

This month, the Pentagon announced that it had shipped to Ukraine more than 1 million Iranian munitions that it had seized en route to Yemen. 

Rubryka reported that the US recently announced a $200 million military aid package to Ukraine.

US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said that the United States would be able to simultaneously provide defense assistance to Ukraine and Israel in the future. He also stated that the new arms package for Israel and Ukraine would be much larger than $2 billion.

What we know about US aid for Ukraine

As Rubryka reported, on the eve of the bill adoption, Republicans in the House of Representatives withdrew $300 million in aid to Ukraine after the House of Representatives voted to remove Kevin McCarthy from the Speaker post.

The Republicans took this step even though the leader of their faction in the House of Representatives and Speaker of the House, Kevin McCarthy, promised not to withdraw funds for Ukraine from the draft defense budget last week.

The $300 million in question is unrelated to the $24 billion in additional funding for Ukraine and related expenses that the White House requested in August, which drew opposition from far-right Republicans.

The US Senate agreed to an alternative project of the short-term budget resolution, which provides more than $6.1 billion in additional aid to Ukraine, including $4.5 billion for defense spending and more than $1.6 billion for economic support.

Before the vote, the White House expressed confidence that Congress could support additional funding for Ukraine's defense needs despite the situation with McCarthy's removal from office.

The Republican Party has nominated Congressman Jim Jordan, who supports Donald Trump and opposes military support for Ukraine in Russia's war, for the position of speaker of the US House of Representatives.