Aid To Ukraine, Sen. Tuberville and Military Promotions, Fourth Republican Debate

Will the U.S. and European Union approve more aid to Ukraine despite the current stalemate?

Senator Tommy Tuberville mostly dropped his protest against a Pentagon rule on abortion.

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On the TED Radio Hour, MIT psychologist Sherry Turkle.

Her latest research into the intimate relationships people are having with chatbots.

Technologies that say, I care about you, I love you, I'm here for you, take care of me.

Ukraine is facing a crisis over billions in military and economic aid from its most important

backers, the United States and the European Union.

Europeans are divided, the U.S. Congress is frozen, and the White House says Russia will

win this war without more funding.

Ukraine's counteroffensive has stalled and Russian forces are advancing.

all this.

Hello, Joanna.

global champion.

U.S. aid to Ukraine is set to run out at the end of this year, and now it looks unlikely

that Congress will approve new aid before then.

Republicans say they won't approve a spending bill that includes $61 billion for Ukraine

unless there's money for border funding.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was supposed to speak via video link to the Senate,

but he canceled at the last minute.

Zelensky's chief of staff, though, is in D.C., and Ukraine's foreign minister insists that

the Ukrainians are lobbying everyone to make sure the funding comes through.

And they're closer to the action, frankly.

Well, it turns out that the leaders of the European Union are also divided.

They're supposed to meet next week to discuss a budget that includes the equivalent of about

$54 billion in military and economic aid to Ukraine.

And they're also set to decide whether to open membership talks with Ukraine.

But any decisions, Michelle, require the approval of all 27 member states.

And right now, the prime minister of Hungary, Viktor Orban, he says he opposes more aid

to Ukraine, as well as opening EU membership talks.

Orban is close to the Kremlin, as is another EU leader, the prime minister of Slovakia.

I spoke with a Ukrainian journalist and soldier, Pavlo Kazarin, about this, and he told me

that all this uncertainty only helps Russia.

He's saying if what we're talking about here is decreasing or stopping aid or the supply

of weapons, of course, this means that Ukraine will lose more territory.

For the last couple of months, Russian forces have been pushing hard to capture Ukrainian

land on two fronts in the east.

The most difficult battle is around a town called Avdiivka.

Before the war, it had about 32,000 people.

It also has Ukraine's largest coke plant, and that's the fuel, not the soda.

Now only a few hundred residents remain in Avdiivka.

They're hiding in basements, and the Russians are advancing.

because Russian forces have fortified their positions and landmined the front, especially

in the south.

I spoke to a member of Ukraine's parliament, Zolomia Bobrovska, as she serves on the Defense

Committee, and she tells me what she's hearing from her constituents.

People understand that if you want to get victory and to take one village and to put

one flag, it costs a lot.

And that's a long way we have to go still.

The mood around the country is much more pessimistic than it was last year.

Joanna Kakissis in Kyiv.

Joanna, thank you so much.

has allowed more than 400 military promotions to proceed.

A hold like this is the prerogative of any senator, though it's rarely used to this extent.

Tuberville was protesting a Pentagon policy that reimbursed service members for traveling

for abortion services.

He admits he failed to change that policy.

We still got a bad policy.

Good morning, Deirdre.

What made Tuberville decide to back down now?

Like, why now?

Senate Republicans who are growing frustrated.

Some sharp rebukes came from military veterans like Iowa Senator Joni Ernst, Alaska Senator

Dan Sullivan, who warned about the damage this was causing to the military.

Also, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer was planning a vote to get around Tuberville's

hold to change how the Senate approves military promotions, and some Senate Republicans were

open to voting for that.

Senators complained Tuberville was blocking hundreds of officers' promotions over a policy

that they weren't involved in crafting.

This was a policy put into place after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.

It covered the costs service members incurred for accessing abortion services.

Some needed to travel out of state following new laws banning the procedure.

Tuberville admitted the holds didn't work, but he said he might fight the policy in court.

We didn't get as much out of it as we wanted.

But again, when they changed the rules on you, I had no opportunity to, other than possibly

down the road, a lawsuit.

Okay, he says he had some success.

Did he?

I mean, no policy change at all.

I mean, he argues he put a spotlight on the issue, but he also admitted any legal fight

he could wage could take a really long time to play out.

His hold to block actions on these promotions was really unprecedented in terms of how many

people it impacted, how long it lasted.

But as Steve mentioned, under Senate rules, any one senator has the ability to place these

holds.

Schumer warned this episode should be a warning to others to not do this.

anything that he wanted.

And I also want to know, he hasn't dropped all the holds.

Has he?

There are still some that he's holding up.

He's still holding up 11 four-star generals.

Tuberville says he wants a more thorough vetting of these top leaders.

The Pentagon is pushing for them to be approved quickly.

The Pentagon spokesman, Brigadier General Pat Ryder, stressed that these generals include

the vice chiefs of various services, the commander of the Pacific Fleet, the Northern Command,

commander of Cyber Command, Space Command.

Ryder says these are all key areas overseeing a lot of policy and need Senate approval quickly.

the families of service members?

Officers were unable to move for their new positions.

That impacted their spouses getting jobs or their kids starting new schools.

Schumer brought up the promotions hours after Tuberville released the hold, and over 400

were approved by voice vote.

Deirdre, thank you.

debate in Alabama.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, the entrepreneur

Vivek Ramaswamy, and former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie.

Former President Trump will not be there instead attending a fundraiser near Miami.

debate, and he's actually here with us in the studio.

Good morning.

I expect a lot of people will be also.

I mean, Haley's got some momentum.

She's actually caught up to DeSantis in the polls.

And that's really led to some greater interest for her on the campaign trail as well as with

donors.

You know, she's also picked up some big money donors in recent weeks.

And this debate is another chance for her to make the case that she's the best alternative

to Trump, who, of course, is still the frontrunner.

DeSantis, meanwhile, is going to try to defend his second place position.

He's really fighting for attention.

So how are they going to sort of handle that or speak to that?

You know, there's going to be a lot of Alabama Republicans in the room, but they don't vote

until Super Tuesday, which is in March.

Republican strategist Doug Hyde told me that's just too late.

He says the most important voters are in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina.

in the debate room, that may fall short of what people see then on TV.

early caucus and primary states.

important to voters in those three states.

And plus, you know, a Republican primary, there's really not a lot of difference between

the policy positions for those remaining candidates.

So they need to stand out in other ways.

It's going to be more about personalities.

I think, Franco, I think we keep saying this over and over again.

I mean, this is the fourth debate.

This is the fourth time he hasn't gone.

Has his absence made a difference?

You know, he still, of course, is going to be, you know, the elephant who is not in the

room.

He's going to likely dominate all parts of the conversation, or at least many parts of

the conversation.

We'll see if the candidates go after him directly, which they haven't so much.

And his hold really remains very strong.

There's no counter-programming, per se.

You know, he hasn't scheduled any other events to kind of steal attention away.

And that's, you know, not insignificant.

I mean, that means maybe more Republicans will tune into the debate.

And really, with fewer candidates on stage, that means they might have some more time

to talk.

They might have some more time to shine.

But, you know, again, this is still very much a race for second place.

And these debates, they're kind of supposed to be these big events in the presidential

primaries, you know, these marquee nights.

But Trump's absence has kind of sapped some of that energy away, kind of taken away some

of the drama that we've come to expect every four years.

That is NPR's Franco O'Donohue.

Franco, thank you.

I'm Michelle Martin.

Today's episode was edited by Mark Ketkoff, Kelsey Snell, and Megan Prats, produced by

Lily Quiroz, Monsi Quarana, and Lindsay Todd.

We get engineering support from the ever-supportive Stacey Abbott, and our technical director is

Zach Coleman.

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