Selective border security, LGBT ideology: 5 things to know about the omnibus bill

By Ryan Foley, Christian Post Reporter Wednesday, December 28, 2022

2. It contains $45 billion for Ukraine

Billed as a selling point by the measure’s supporters, the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2023 contains more than $45 billion in supplemental funding to Ukraine as the Eastern European nation continues to grapple with the fallout stemming from Russia’s invasion earlier this year. Specifically, the spending package sets aside $9 billion “to provide assistance, including training, equipment, weapons, logistics support, supplies and services, salaries and stipends, sustainment, and intelligence support to Ukraine’s military.”

The money reserved for Ukraine also includes nearly $12 billion to replenish stocks of equipment sent to Ukraine by the U.S. and nearly $7 billion in funding to the European Command. Some $6 million of the $45 billion will go to oversight to monitor the use of the equipment provided to Ukraine.

Additional, non-defense related spending for Ukraine consists of $55 million in food and nutrition-related grants, $300 million to secure Ukrainian energy independence and security, $2.4 billion for Ukrainian refugees, $2.47 billion in humanitarian assistance, $13.37 billion in budgetary assistance to Ukraine, $560 million in security assistance and $166 million for the U.S. State Department to “respond to the situation in Ukraine.”

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Critics of the funding for Ukraine focus both on the magnitude of the spending and what they view as a lack of corresponding oversight, as well as concerns about the Ukrainian government’s actions toward Christians and its crackdown on the media in the country.

Former U.S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, a Democrat who switched her partisan affiliation to Independent, maintained that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has “shut down any media” that “his government does not control” and has “threatened to punish ‘any Christian worshiping in unapproved ways.’”