House Speaker Mike Johnson on Sunday defended his push of a stand-alone bill to provide aid to Israel after the Senate struck tentative immigration deal that it intends to vote on this week.
During an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” moderator Kristen Welker asked Johnson, R-La., whether he proposed the stand-alone Israel aid package to kill the compromise deal in the Senate.
“No, we’ve made very clear what the requirements of the House were, and that is to solve the problem at the border,” he said, adding that the House has been “awaiting” action from the Senate.
“We cannot wait any longer. The House is willing to lead, and the reason we have to take care of this Israel situation right now is because the situation has escalated,” he said, noting recent airstrikes by the U.S. targeting Iran-backed militant groups in retaliation for the killing of three American soldiers.
Prior to Johnson’s appearance, national security adviser Jake Sullivan told Welker that the Biden administration viewed the letter as a “ploy.”
“We regard the ploy and we see it as a ploy that’s been put forward on the House side right now as not being a serious effort to deal with the national security challenges America faces,” he said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
Sullivan did not address Welker’s question about whether President Joe Biden would sign a standalone Israel aid bill, but the National Security Council’s coordinator for strategic communications, John Kirby, has previously indicated that Biden would not, saying in November, “The president would veto an only-Israel bill. We — I think that we’ve made that clear.”