WASHINGTON—Last night, the United States Senate advanced a foreign aid package that provides $95 billion in aid to Ukraine, Israel, and the Indo-Pacific after the legislation passed in the United States House of Representatives on Saturday. President Joe Biden is expected to sign the supplemental shortly into law. 

Heritage Foundation Vice President of the Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Institute for National Security and Foreign Policy and former Deputy National Security Advisor to President Donald J. Trump Victoria Coates issued the following statement in response to last night’s Senate passage: 

“Proponents of Congress’ latest foreign aid package believe that it sends a strong message to Communist China. They’re right—but it may not be the message the supporters of the supplemental imagine it is.  

“Beijing will likely view this $95 billion package as a victory. It advances their goals to become the world’s hegemon and undermine U.S. interests.

“The supplemental provides $60 billion for Ukraine under “emergency” budgeting. This is a double win for Beijing because it ensures that the U.S. will remain the funder of choice for Ukraine and saddles the American economy with more debt on top of its existing $34 trillion. The $26 billion for Israel rightly includes more than $14 billion in security assistance for the Jewish state—which is actually an emergency—but it also includes $9 billion for the Palestinians. That means the U.S. is trying to play both sides of that conflict and could be directly funding the terrorists who attacked Israel on Oct. 7th. 

“The aid package only allocates $8 billion for the Indo-Pacific, which indicates that the U.S. believes that countering Communist China is less of a priority than providing humanitarian assistance to the Palestinians. 

“But the most egregious problem with the new package is that it provides $0 for border security during the worst crisis in American history. The exponential surge in illegal military-age Chinese males attempting to cross our southern border will remain the status quo, which will no doubt please Beijing.

“Simply put, Congress’ latest foreign aid package does the opposite of what it says it does, namely deter China. In reality, it does not advance American interests and emboldens our top adversary.”