Senate democrats oppose oversight office of US aid for Ukraine

Senate Democrats banded together Wednesday night to oppose the creation of a new office to audit US military assistance for Ukraine as part of a provision in the annual defense spending bill.

Forty-five Democrats — including every member of the Senate Armed Services Committee — voted down an amendment to establish an Office of the Lead Inspector General for Ukraine Assistance as part of the fiscal year 2024 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA).

Sen. Angus King (I-Maine), Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) also joined the Democrats in rejecting the new oversight office.

The Democratic opposition — which included several senators in vulnerable seats such as Jacky Rosen of Nevada, Joe Manchin of West Virginia, Sherrod Brown of Ohio and Bob Casey of Pennsylvania — kept the amendment from clearing the required 60-vote threshold to be part of the bill.

If passed, it would have allotted $10 million from the NDAA’s $886 billion budget toward the creation of a 30-person inspector general’s office.

Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) and Sen. Jim Risch (R-Idaho) drafted the provision.

“I am dismayed that my Democrat colleagues withheld support for this reasonable, effective effort to conduct additional oversight of US aid to Ukraine,” Wicker said in a statement. “Lawmakers are far better positioned to support Ukraine when taxpayers feel confident that their money is spent on a transparent and effective basis. I will continue promoting rigorous oversight of Ukrainian military aid as I also push the Biden administration to provide Ukraine the weapons it needs to win this war.”

It was also co-sponsored by a broad coalition that included critics of defense aid for Ukraine such as Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.).

“I guess all of a sudden we have billions of dollars laying around that we can just give to Ukraine,” Hawley said in March on Fox News. “It’s an affront to the American taxpayers, the American people, and it’s gotta stop.”

Sinema, Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.), and Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah.) also sponsored the provision to lend funding following Russia’s unprovoked invasion of the nation on Feb. 24, 2022.

Kennedy and Sinema wrote a USA Today op-ed in June defending US assistance to Ukraine while still calling for an independent auditor to provide transparency to taxpayers about the funding.

“Ukraine is not without flaws. We’ve heard several unsettling reports of bad actors exploiting our generosity,” the senators wrote. “Some of our costly weapons have ended up in black markets. And corrupt officials have tried to line their own pockets.”

“President Volodymyr Zelensky is working to hold bad actors accountable. He has fired several top officials ensnared in a corruption scandal,” they added. “We trust that our friends in Ukraine take corruption seriously. We must verify, too.”

Rather than “a patchwork of watchdogs” at the Pentagon, State Department and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), Kennedy and Sinema advocated for a single inspector general— similar to the one appointed in 2008 to oversee Afghanistan spending.

Paul in a separate amendment had suggested that the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) be given oversight of Ukraine instead.

Under Wicker’s amendment, President Biden would have been given authority to appoint the inspector general for Ukraine assistance.

On Tuesday, the president approved an additional $400 million in Ukraine aid.

The US has spent as much as $113 billion on funding to the war-torn nation in 2022, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.

 “It’s nothing short of a slap in the face to every hard-working American citizen when career politicians like Sherrod Brown actively oppose transparency for how they’re spending our money,” Ohio GOP Senate candidate Bernie Moreno told The Post. “It’s not unreasonable to demand, let alone expect, our elected officials to treat our tax dollars with the respect it is due. We’ve spent over $100 billion in Ukraine and it’s outrageous that Sherrod Brown would oppose even a simple audit of how that money has been spent.”

“While everyday Americans are struggling with Biden’s inflation, Democrats like Jacky Rosen vote to harass Americans with thousands of new IRS agents while sending billions in taxpayer dollars overseas and won’t even support basic oversight,” Nevada GOP Senate candidate Sam Brown told The Post. “We need real accountability for every dollar spent in Ukraine.”

The Senate is deliberating this week over the NDAA and is expected to pass a final version of the legislation after the August recess.