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      Marjorie Taylor Greene Is Not as Powerful as She Thinks She Is

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      In an interview last week, NewsNation’s Blake Burman asked Speaker Mike Johnson about Marjorie Taylor Greene, and before Burman could finish his question, Johnson responded with classic Southern scorn. “Bless her heart,” he said, and then he told Burman that Greene wasn’t proving to be a serious lawmaker and that he didn’t spend a lot of time thinking about her.Strangely enough, Johnson’s dismissal of Greene — on the eve of her potential effort to oust him from the office he won in October — spoke as loudly as his decision to put a vote for Ukraine aid on the floor in the first place. In spite of the Republican Party’s narrow majority in the House and the constant threat of a motion to vacate the chair, he will not let MAGA’s most extreme lawmaker run the place.To understand the significance of this moment, it’s necessary to understand the changing culture of the MAGAfied Republican Party. After eight years of Donald Trump’s dominance, we know the fate of any Republican politician who directly challenges him — the confrontation typically ends his or her political career in the most miserable way possible, with dissenters chased out of office amid a hail of threats and insults. Jeff Flake, Bob Corker, Adam Kinzinger and Liz Cheney are but a few of the many Republicans who dared to defy Trump and paid a high political price.But there’s an open question: Does the MAGA movement have the same control over the Republican Party when Trump isn’t directly in the fray? Can it use the same tactics to impose party discipline and end political careers? If the likes of Greene or Steve Bannon or Matt Gaetz or Charlie Kirk can wield the same power, then the transformation of the party will be complete. It won’t be simply in thrall to Trump; it will be in thrall to his imitators and heirs and perhaps lost to the reactionary right for a generation or more.I don’t want to overstate the case, but Johnson’s stand — together with the Democrats’ response — gives me hope. Consider the chain of events. On April 12, Johnson appeared at Mar-a-Lago and received enough of a blessing from Trump to make it clear that Trump didn’t want him removed. Days before a vote on Ukraine aid that directly defied the MAGA movement, Trump said Johnson was doing a “very good job.”Days later, Johnson got aid to Ukraine passed with more Democratic votes than Republican — a violation of the so-called Hastert Rule, an informal practice that says the speaker shouldn’t bring a vote unless the measure is supported by a majority within his own party. Greene and the rest of MAGA exploded, especially when Democratic lawmakers waved Ukrainian flags on the House floor. Greene vowed to force a vote on her motion to end Johnson’s speakership. She filed the motion in March as a “warning” to Johnson, and now she’s following through — directly testing her ability to transform the House.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Russia Bombs Power Plants and Ukraine Targets Refineries in Dueling Attacks

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      As missiles caused extensive damage to Ukraine’s power grid, Kyiv continued drone assaults inside Russia that have drawn criticism from Washington.As Russian missiles streaked through the skies above Ukraine before dawn on Saturday, once again targeting the nation’s already battered energy grid in a broad and complex bombardment, Ukrainian drones were flying in the other direction, taking aim at vital oil and gas refineries and other targets inside Russia.The Ukrainian Air Force said its air defense teams had intercepted 21 of the 34 Russian cruise and ballistic missiles fired from land, air and sea-based systems, but the attack caused extensive damage to four thermal power plants and other critical parts of the power grid in three regions.Russia’s Ministry of Defense said it had shot down 66 Ukrainian drones over the Krasnodar region, which is just across the Kerch Strait in southern Russia, east of the occupied Crimean Peninsula.Veniamin Kondratyev, the head of the regional government, said the Ukrainian drones had targeted two oil refineries, a bitumen plant, and a military airfield in Kuban.The Security Service of Ukraine, known as the S.B.U., said the Ukrainian military operation had targeted the Kushchevsk airfield and the Ilsky and Slavyansk oil refineries. The airfield housed “dozens of military aircraft, radars and electronic warfare devices,” the agency said in a statement, adding, “The S.B.U. continues to effectively target military and infrastructural facilities behind enemy lines, reducing Russia’s potential for waging war.”The Kremlin tightly controls information about Ukrainian attacks, often making it difficult to assess their impact, and it was unclear how much damage the drone strikes caused.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Russia Strikes Ukraine’s Railways and Vows to Slow Arrival of U.S. Aid

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      The attacks killed at least six civilians and injured dozens of others, the Ukrainian military and local officials said.Russia attacked railway facilities in three different regions across Ukraine on Thursday night and Friday morning, as the country’s defense minister vowed to step up strikes aimed at slowing the flow of critically needed American weapons and equipment to the front.At least 31 civilians were injured and six killed in the attacks, according to the Ukrainian military and local officials. Three of the dead were railway workers killed by a strike in the Donetsk region. In Balakliya, a rail hub in the Kharkiv region, 13 passengers on a regional train were injured when a missile hit the station. Russia also attacked a railway facility in the Cherkasy region but no casualties were reported.Ukrainian railways, with an estimated 12,000 miles of tracks and 230,000 employees, have played a crucial role in the war, evacuating civilians from frontline areas, transporting everything from grain to humanitarian assistance around the country, and moving heavy weapons supplied by Western allies along carefully guarded and hidden supply lines.The latest attacks on the rail network came after Russia’s defense minister, Sergei Shoigu, promised to target Western weapons as they arrived in Ukraine. “We will increase the intensity of strikes on logistics centers and storage bases of Western weapons,” he said in a speech Tuesday at the ministry.On Friday afternoon, Kyiv City Hall announced the evacuation of two hospitals next door to each other in the capital, citing a threat from Russia to attack them. A video had circulated online showing a man, presumed to be a Russian official, naming the address and asserting that soldiers were being treated in them, “hiding behind the backs of children.” The City Council’s statement said that this claim was untrue. The video’s origin had not been independently verified by The New York Times. We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Schumer Says Bill to Aid Ukraine and Israel Shows Congress Isn’t Broken

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      The majority leader says the measure to help Ukraine and other recent bipartisan efforts show there is a path to success on Capitol Hill. But deep partisan differences and institutional problems remain.Senator Chuck Schumer, the New York Democrat and majority leader, insists that Congress isn’t broken — it just has a stubborn glitch.As he celebrated approval this week of a major national security spending measure to aid Ukraine and Israel that took months of wrangling and strategizing, Mr. Schumer said the success of the package validated his view that bipartisanship can prevail once extreme elements on Capitol Hill are sidelined.“I don’t think that Congress is dysfunctional,” Mr. Schumer said in an interview. “It’s that there are some dysfunctional people in Congress, and we can’t let them run the show.”The majority leader said that the passage of the foreign aid bill, the renewal of a warrantless electronic surveillance program and the approval of government funding for the year have shown that Congress can still function if its damaging glitch — right-wing lawmakers invested in chaos — is dealt out.“They are nasty, they are negative and they don’t want to get anything done at all,” Mr. Schumer said of far-right Republicans in the House. He noted that Congress had been able to move ahead on big issues once Speaker Mike Johnson and a significant bloc of House Republicans decided to marginalize the ultraconservatives, even though it has prompted a threat to Mr. Johnson’s speakership.“The idea that Congress can’t function in this modern world with technology and everything else — which admittedly makes it harder — has been disproved by a whole lot of things that succeeded in a bipartisan way,” he said. “But in each case, the hard right had to be resisted.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      in US Politics

      Biden signs $95bn foreign aid package for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan

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      Joe Biden has signed into law a bill that rushes $95bn in foreign aid to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, a bipartisan legislative victory he hailed as a “good day for world peace” after months of congressional gridlock threatened Washington’s support for Kyiv in its fight to repel Russia’s invasion.The Senate overwhelmingly passed the measure in a 79 -18 vote late on Tuesday night, after the package won similarly lopsided approval in the Republican controlled House, despite months of resistance from an isolationist bloc of hardline conservatives opposed to helping Ukraine.“It’s going to make America safer. It’s going to make the world safer,” Biden said, in remarks delivered from the White House, shortly after signing the bill.“It was a difficult path,” he continued. “It should have been easier and it should have gotten there sooner. But in the end, we did what America always does. We rose to the moment, came together, and we got it done.”The White House first sent its request for the foreign aid package to Congress in October, and US officials have said the months-long delay hurt Ukraine on the battlefield. Promising to “move fast”, Biden said the US would begin shipping weapons and equipment to Ukraine within a matter of hours.Biden admonished “Maga Republicans” for blocking the aid package as Ukrainian soldiers were running out of artillery shells and ammunition as Iran, China and North Korea helped Russia to ramp up its aerial assault on Ukrainian cities and critical infrastructure.Rejecting the view that Ukraine is locked in an unwinnable conflict that has become a drain on US resources, Biden hailed Ukraine’s army as a “fighting force with the will and the skill to win”.But the president also pressed the case that supporting Ukraine was in the national security interest of the US.“If [Vladimir] Putin triumphs in Ukraine, the next move of Russian forces could very well be a direct attack on a Nato ally,” he said, describing what would happen if article 5 of the alliance’s charter, which requires the collective defense of a member in the event of an outside attack.“We’d have no choice but to come to their aid, just like our Nato allies came to our aid after the September 11 attacks.”He also promoted the bill as an investment in America’s industrial base, spurring the production of military equipment in states like Alabama, Arizona, Ohio and Pennsylvania, where some of the factories are located.The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, who had pleaded for help replenishing his country’s emptying war chest during a December visit to Washington, expressed gratitude to the president and lawmakers for pressing ahead with the security bill despite its long odds.“I am grateful to the United States Senate for approving vital aid to Ukraine today,” he wrote on X, adding: “Ukraine’s long-range capabilities, artillery, and air defense are critical tools for restoring just peace sooner.”The aid comes at a precarious moment for Ukraine, as the country’s beleaguered army attempts to fend off Russian advances. Zelenskiy has said Ukraine badly needed air defense systems and “long-range capabilities”.Shortly after the president signed the foreign aid bill, the Pentagon announced plans to “surge” $1bn in new military assistance to Ukraine. The package includes air defense interceptors, artillery rounds, armored vehicles, and anti-tank weapons.In total the legislation includes $60.8bn to replenish Ukraine’s war chest as it seeks to repel Russia from its territory; $26.3bn for Israel and humanitarian relief for civilians in conflict zones, including Gaza; and $8.1bn for the Indo-Pacific region to bolster its defenses against China.In an effort to attract Republican support, the security bill includes a provision that could see a nationwide ban on TikTok. The House also added language mandating the president seek repayment from Kyiv for roughly $10bn in economic assistance in the form of “forgivable loans”, an idea first floated by Donald Trump, who has stoked anti-Ukraine sentiment among conservatives.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionAlthough support for the package was overwhelming, several Democrats have expressed their concern with sending Israel additional military aid as it prosecutes a war that has killed more than 34,000 people in Gaza and plunged the territory into a humanitarian crisis. Three progressive senators, Bernie Sanders, Peter Welch of Vermont and Jeff Merkley of Oregon, voted against the bill for its inclusion of military support to Israel.On Wednesday, Biden called the aid to Israel “vital”, especially in the wake of Iran’s unprecedented aerial assault on the country. Israel, with help from the US, UK and Jordan, intercepted nearly all of the missiles and drones and there were no reported fatalities. The attack had been launched in retaliation against an Israeli strike on an Iranian consular site in Syria.“My commitment to Israel, I want to make clear again, is ironclad,” Biden said. “The security of Israel is critical. I will always make sure that Israel has what it needs to defend itself against Iran and terrorists who it supports.”Biden’s abiding support for Israel’s war in Gaza has hurt his political standing with key parts of the Democratic coalition, especially among young people. As he spoke, students at some of the nation’s most prestigious universities were demonstrating against the war.Biden emphasized that the bill also increases humanitarian assistance to Gaza, touting his administration’s efforts to pressure Israel to allow more aid into the devastated territory. But House Republicans added a provision to the bill prohibiting funds to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, Unrwa, a “lifeline for the Palestinian people in Gaza” that Israel has sought to disband.An independent review published this week said that Israel had yet to present evidence of its claims that employees of the relief agency are affiliated with terrorist organizations.“We’re going to immediately secure that aid and surge it, including food, medical supplies, clean water, and Israel must make sure all this aid reaches the Palestinians in Gaza without delay,” Biden said.Biden’s signatures marks the conclusion of the grueling journey on Capitol Hill. It was not clear whether the bill had a path forward amid the opposition of the newly installed House speaker, Mike Johnson, who holds a tenuous grip on his party’s vanishingly thin majority.Under pressure from his right flank, Johnson initially refused to allow a vote on Ukraine aid unless it was paired with a border clampdown. But then Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee for president, derailed a bipartisan border bill that included significant concessions to hardline conservatives, determined not to hand Biden an election-year victory on an issue that plays to his political advantage.Lobbied by the White House, European allies and pro-Ukraine Republicans, the House speaker finally relented, risking his job to bypass rightwing opposition and pass the foreign aid bill with the help of Democrats.Biden noted the absence of the immigration reform measure, which he called the “strongest border security bill this country has ever seen”, and committed to returning to the issue at another time.Despite the dysfunction in Washington, Biden said passing the bill proved a guiding principle of his presidential campaign: that there was enough goodwill left to forge compromise where it matters.“This vote makes it clear,” he said. “There is a bipartisan consensus for that kind of American leadership. That’s exactly what we’ll continue to deliver.” More

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      Chuck Schumer lauds Senate’s ‘greatest achievement in years’ as foreign aid bill passes – video

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      The US Senate has voted resoundingly by 79 to 18 to approve $95bn in aid for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, as a bipartisan super-majority united to send the long-stalled package to Joe Biden’s desk for signature. The bill was approved after proceedings that were hailed by the Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, as ‘one of the greatest achievements the Senate has faced in years’ More

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      in US Politics

      US Senate close to passing $95bn aid for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan after key vote

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      The US Senate on Tuesday was preparing to give final approval to a $95bn in wartime aid for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, with a bipartisan coalition eager to send the long-stalled package to Joe Biden’s desk for signature.In a sweeping 80-19 vote, the Senate overwhelmingly voted to advance the measure in a step hailed by the Senate majority leader as “one of the greatest achievements the Senate has faced in years”.“Today the Senate sends a unified message to the entire world: America will always defend democracy in its hour of need,” said Chuck Schumer in a floor speech moments after the Senate moved toward final passage of the bill, possibly as early as Tuesday evening.“Make no mistake, America will deliver on its promise to act like a leader on the world stage, to hold the line against autocratic thugs like Vladimir Putin,” he continued. “We are showing Putin that betting against America is always, always a grave mistake.”After months of delays and setbacks, the House last week approved four bills to rush funding to three American allies while approving a conservative proposal that could lead to a nationwide ban of the social media platform TikTok. The measures were combined into one large package that the Senate will take up on Tuesday.The legislation includes $60.8bn to replenish Ukraine’s war chest as it seeks to repel Russia from its territory; $26.3bn for Israel and humanitarian relief for civilians in conflict zones, including Gaza; and $8.1bn for the Indo-Pacific region to bolster its defenses against China.In a call on Monday, Biden informed the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, that he would “move quickly” to send desperately needed military aid, including air defense weaponry, to the country following the bill’s passage by the Senate.In a move to bolster Republican support, the GOP-controlled House added a provision that would see TikTok blocked in the US unless its Chinese-owned parent company divests from the social media platform within a year. Much of the foreign aid section of the bill mirrors what the Senate passed in February, with the addition of a measure mandating the president seek repayment from Kyiv for roughly $10bn in economic assistance in the form of “forgivable loans”, an idea first floated by Donald Trump, who was initially opposed to aiding Ukraine.A vast majority of senators was expected to support the package on final passage. In the test vote earlier on Tuesday, 17 hardline Republican senators opposed moving forward with the measure. Among them was Rick Scott, the Florida senator, who said he supported several provisions in the bill, including the TikTok ban and aid for Israel, but could not endorse sending billions of US taxpayer dollars to Ukraine.Two progressive senators, Democrat Jeff Merkley and independent Bernie Sanders, voted against the procedural rule, saying they could not support providing additional military aid to Israel at a time when its government is waging a war that has killed more than 34,000 Palestinians in Gaza and pushed the territory to the brink of famine.“We are now in the absurd situation where Israel is using US military assistance to block the delivery of US humanitarian aid to Palestinians,” Sanders said in remarks on the Senate floor. “If that is not crazy, I don’t know what is.”The Vermont senator sought to introduce two amendments: one that would end offensive military funding to Israel, citing Americans’ “increasing disgust” for Benjamin Netanyahu’s “war machine”, and another to restore funding to the UN relief agency Unrwa. Both were blocked from consideration, a move he denounced as a “dark day for democracy”.The foreign aid package largely resembles the measure passed by the Senate in February. But several Republican senators who voted against it then reversed course and on Tuesday gave their approval.Among them was Lindsey Graham, a longtime defense hawk who previously opposed the Senate’s foreign aid package because it wasn’t paired with border legislation but on Tuesday voted to advance it. Following a visit to Ukraine earlier this year, Graham endorsed Trump’s loan plan and has since pointed to Iran’s aerial attack on Israel as a reason send aid to the country.“Israel needs the US Senate now. No excuses,” Graham wrote on X before voting to advance the bill.The Senate’s passage of the aid package caps a tortured odyssey on Capitol Hill that began last year with a request for the White House for a fresh round of funding for Ukraine and for Israel, reeling from the 7 October cross-border attack by Hamas.Despite broad congressional support, the effort almost immediately stalled as a faction of Republicans, increasingly skeptical of US involvement in foreign entanglements, resisted sending more aid to Ukraine. Conservatives began insisting that any funding to foreign countries be paired with legislation aimed at stemming the rise of people arriving at the US-Mexico border.When a bipartisan border and national security bill negotiated in the Senate collapsed, Schumer proceeded to move forward with a vote on the foreign aid bill up for a vote. It passed overwhelmingly in a 70-29 vote in February, but had no clear path forward in the Republican-controlled House, where the new speaker, Mike Johnson, dithered as Ukraine suffered battlefield losses.Personal entreaties from Biden, congressional leaders and European heads of state, participation in high-level intelligence briefings as House speaker, and prayer eventually persuaded Johnson to act. The decision may come at a political cost: his job.“History judges us for what we do,” Johnson said at an emotional press conference last week, after a bipartisan coalition of lawmakers passed the aid package by lopsided margins.In remarks on Tuesday, Schumer praised Johnson, who he said “rose to the occasion”, as well as Mitch McConnell, the Republican Senate leader with whom the Democrat said he had worked “hand in hand and shoulder to shoulder to get this bill done”.“A lot of people inside and outside the Congress wanted this package to fail,” Schumer said. “But today those in Congress who stand on the side of democracy are winning the day.”McConnell has made funding Ukraine’s war effort a legacy-building quest, after announcing his decision to step down as the long-serving Senate Republican leader. In a lengthy floor speech ahead of the procedural vote on Tuesday, McConnell confronted the strain of “America first” isolationism favored by Trump and his loyalists in Congress that is rife and growing within the Republican party.“Today’s action is overdue, but our work does not end here,” he said. “Trust in American resolve is not rebuilt overnight. Expanding and restocking the arsenal of democracy doesn’t just happen by magic.” More