Biden's Final Push For More Ukraine Aid

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It's true what they say the days are long, but the years are short. Amen. Hey, there. It's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Susan Davis. I cover politics. I'm Tom Bowman. I cover the Pentagon. And I'm Deirdre Walsh. I cover Congress. And today on the show, how President Biden is trying to help Ukraine's defense efforts before he leaves office. His successor, Donald Trump, is skeptical of continuing aid to Ukraine and wants to help quickly negotiate an end to the war. Tom, first, just give us an update on the ground. What's the state of the war right now?

Well, let's say there was something of a stalemate. Russia is making advances in Ukraine's east, but the big news is President Biden has finally allowed U.S. long-range missiles that can travel 190 miles.

allowing them to be used inside Russia.

where the Ukrainian forces back in August made an incursion. So this heavy fighting going on there. So the U.S. is allowing those long-range missiles to be used, and the French and the Brits have also weighed in, allowing their missiles to be used in this Kursk area. Deirdre change is coming in January in a lot of ways, but under President Biden, he was able to keep cobbled together this bipartisan support in Congress to keep aiding Ukraine. It might be an understatement to say that's likely to see a very different result come January 20th.

We are definitely looking at a major change in power on this issue specifically come January. Obviously, Republicans took control of the Senate. The House remains in Republican hands, and Trump comes to the White House with a completely different strategy when it comes to Ukraine. And you see some of the top picks in his incoming administration reflect the change in the Republican Party. You have people like Florida Senator Marco Rubio, who's tapped to be the Secretary of State,

who had been supporting aid to Ukraine, but he voted against the last package in April. That's 61 billion dollars. There's still some of that money left to go out the door to pay for things like Tom just described.

Florida Congressman Mike Walz, who has been tapped to be the president's national security adviser, also voted against that aid, had supported Ukraine in the past. But it just shows you sort of, Trump is leading the Republican Party to push for an end to the war in Ukraine. There are still Russia hawks on the hill that have significant posts. And we'll, I think, see a big divide continue to play out, you know,

Mitch McConnell stepped down as Republican leader in the Senate, but he will be chairing the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, which is not a small job in Washington, which is a big job in Washington. And he knows that. And he has been very blunt about the fact that he wants to be a big voice in defense policy, foreign policy. And you still have chairs of these committees that oversee the Pentagon.

that support helping Ukraine. And they will be battling with new incoming members who campaigned on getting out of the war in Ukraine. But it sounds like there's no question. We are entering into a new era. Mike Walts over the weekend said he wants to see a responsible end to the war in Ukraine. Member President Electrom said, I can end this in one day.

What it looks like is it's going to end Putin's favor. J.D. Vance, the Vice President-elect, has said, let's freeze the front lines. Tom, for those of us that don't speak battlefield, what does freeze the front lines mean? It means you end the war where the troops are located. That could be Russian troops in Ukrainian territory, but it ends right there. The big question is, what will Ukrainians get out of any sort of peace deal?

They would like to be a member of NATO that's unlikely to happen. You have to get 31 members to sign off on it. They could get a lot more weaponry, maybe from the U.S., but of course Trump is transactional. He may say the Ukrainians have to buy American-made missiles and

other equipment. It's not going to be a gift from the United States. Interestingly, just today, Germany announced that five European countries will step up support for Ukraine's defense industry. Germany, France, Britain, Italy, Poland, just today they announced that, clearly with an eye to who's coming into the White House.

And politically, this is one of the things I think about where on this issue in particular, this was a big, loud issue in the 2024 campaign. If Ukraine was being litigated in this election, it seems pretty decisively that not only did Donald Trump win, but so did the Senate Republicans that took over the majority, all Ukraine's skeptics. I mean, the party does seem to just be moving tactically in a different direction and with the support of the American people. Remember Trump's slogan, America first. He campaigned on that.

people up and down the ticket for Congress campaigned on that. There was a big focus on we need to be spending more resources to deal with our security at the U.S.-Mexico border, not spend money sending weapons and supporting this effort overseas in Ukraine. I think there was a lot of noise where candidates I talked to

incumbent Republicans, I talked to, talked about fears from people back home that eventually Americans can get dragged into the war in Ukraine. That was never something that the Biden administration even talked about. But President-elect Trump sort of threatened that it was out there and it sort of became, I think, some misinformation in part of the political debate about what would be happening next in Ukraine. And I think that's why you saw a lot of candidates echo the top of the ticket.

And part of that misinformation, of course, was the anti-Ukraine vote. Voices were always sending all this money to Ukraine. Most of that money is being spent in the U.S. by defense contractors who are building additional plants, hiring more workers. You can see that continue. They have to replenish their missiles, their artillery rounds, and other things like that. You can see that continue well into the future.

And once those new incoming members come to Congress and hear from their constituents, we may see votes a little bit different in these defensive appropriations bills. Okay, let's take a quick break and we'll talk more about what the negotiated piece might look like.

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And we're back. And Tom, as you noted earlier, Donald Trump campaign saying that he could quickly bring an end to this war, that he could negotiate peace between Ukraine and Russia. What does that look like? What has he broadly said that he wants to do to resolve this conflict? You know, he hasn't really said, of course, he says, I'm the best dealmaker in the world. I can end it on day one, but we don't know exactly what that will look like. But it seems like it would end on terms that are favorable to Putin.

You know, he would love to see this war come to an end and leave Russian troops where they are inside Ukraine. The Russian control about 18% of the country. So it would be in his interest to say, yeah, let's just stop it. And I'll stay where I am. And he also still, of course, holds Crimea.

So again, if it's going to end like that, it's very favorable to Putin. And then how would you do that? Would you sit down with NATO members and just say it's time to end it? They may say, no, I don't think it's a good idea. We want to continue to support Ukraine, give them more weapons. I think they can do a better job. We just don't know other than what Trump said. I can end it on day one.

Do you have any sense from the Ukrainian side of this, how they're looking at the incoming Trump administration, which for their own interest seems much more hostile than the Biden administration has been? No, I think they're clearly nervous about the way ahead, right? Will they get any support from the US? Will they have to rely on NATO? And again, Germany announced this plan by five European countries to beef up their support for Ukraine's defense industry. What does that look like? What do they build?

And what can they do going forward? They're doing a really good job with their drones heading into Moscow even. So what does that look like? It really is uncharted waters at this point other than I want to end it.

Jared is incredibly fascinating too as we've seen these shifting alliances on Capitol Hill where some of now the strongest supporters of Ukraine reside in the Democratic Party who will not have a very strong hand to play in the Trump administration. And even though there might still be a formidable coalition of power players in Washington who back Ukraine, Mitch McConnell being one of them, he doesn't have the same seat at the table he used to.

Right. It's a completely different group of people that have sort of the reins going forward starting January 20th. I mean, to Tom's point about some of these other countries divvying up weapons. I think part of the Biden administration's approach to Ukraine

is to try to build these alliances and try to have more people. Allies help with the defense of Ukraine against Russia. I sort of wonder what happens to that when the US potentially steps back from a leadership role and Ukraine will be in a much weaker position. And what does that do with allies on Capitol Hill? Will they be able to say?

Hey, can we at least do XYZ while this peace negotiation is going forward? It doesn't sound like they're going to have much power in that negotiation. And it's also, like you said, you had Democrats completely united behind the Biden administration and the division being in the Republican Party. I don't know that that's going to continue going forward. I just sort of think the Democratic Party is trying to figure out why a lot of these people

supported Trump and his priorities focused on the economy at home. And what does that do to the Democrats' approach to chipping in this kind of federal resources going forward? That's a really good point. Okay, that is it for us today. I'm Susan Davis. I cover politics. I'm Tom Bowman. I cover the Pentagon. And I'm Deirdre Walsh. I cover Congress. And thanks for listening to the NPR Politics podcast.

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