On Thursday, US President Joe Biden signed into law a federal services budget bill totaling $1.7 trillion, $45 of which is earmarked for Ukraine. The Democratic leader, on vacation in the US Virgin Islands, tweeted a photo of him signing the text. This law should allow for the smooth functioning of the American federal state, i.e. law enforcement, diplomacy, the military and economic policy, to be financed until September 2023.
“(The law) will invest in medical research, safety, health care for veterans”, relief after natural disasters or programs against violence against women, commented President Joe Biden, providing “crucial assistance to Ukraine”.
Candidate in 2024?
The text had received the support of some Republicans, ensuring an easy passage and offering legislative success to Joe Biden as his second year in the White House is coming to an end. This year should also be the year of his decision on his candidacy, or not, for the presidency of 2024.
The law provides $45 billion in economic and military support to Ukraine in order to fight the Russian invasion. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky went to Washington in December to ask for more aid.
It also includes an amendment to a 19th-century law to mention that the US vice president cannot directly intervene in the certification of election results.
Donald Trump had exploited the ambiguities of the old text to suggest that Mike Pence, his vice president, could have stopped Joe Biden’s rise to power after a victory that the outgoing Republican did not want to acknowledge, one of the elements that led to the assault on the Capitol on January 6, 2021.
