WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden on Wednesday signed into law a $95 billion package to provide critical aid to Ukraine and enact a provision that could lead to a nationwide ban on TikTok.
"It’s going to make America safer, it’s gonna make the world safer, and it continues America’s leadership in the world, and everyone knows gives vital support to America’s partners," Biden said Wednesday in remarks praising the package's passage. "And so they can defend themselves against threats to their sovereignty."
The Senate passed the long-awaited foreign aid package Tuesday in a 79-18 vote. Fifteen Republicans and three Democrats voted against the legislation. The House passed the package on Saturday.
Biden on Wednesday acknowledged the time it took for the bill to gain the bipartisan support it needed to pass.
“It was a difficult path,” he said. “It should have been easier and it should have gotten there sooner. But in the end, we did what America always does: We rose to the moment, came together and we got it done.”
Biden condemned Russian President Vladimir Putin while stressing the urgency of providing aid to Ukraine, saying that in the next few hours the U.S. will begin sending equipment to the country from its own stockpiles and then will replace those stockpiles with new American-made products that include patriot missiles and artillery shells.
“In other words, we’re helping Ukraine while at the same time investing in our own industrial base, strengthening our own national security, supporting jobs in nearly 40 states all across America,” he said.
“America stands with our friends, we stand up against dictators,” he added. “We bow to no one, to no one. Certainly not Vladimir Putin.”
Biden reiterated his stance that Israel has a right to defend itself in its war against Hamas and that the foreign aid package he signed into law will allow the U.S. to help replenish Israel’s air defense and provide other critical aid in an effort to prevent attacks similar to the strikes carried out by Iran this month.
The president noted that the foreign aid package also provides $1 billion of additional humanitarian assistance to the people of Gaza, which he said would allow the U.S. to send food, medical supplies and clean water to the region.
Biden said border security should have been in the package and vowed to “come back to that in another moment, another time.”
The president concluded his remarks without mentioning the package's crackdown on TikTok.
The package includes $60 billion in aid to Ukraine that President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said would give his country “a chance at victory” against Russia. It also includes $26 billion in assistance to Israel and humanitarian relief in Gaza, in addition to $8 billion for security in Taiwan and the Indo-Pacific.
And it will give TikTok’s China-based parent company nine months, which the president could extend to a year, to sell the popular social media platform or be banned in the U.S. That puts TikTok closer than ever before to a prohibition while ensuring that it won’t be banned until after the 2024 election. TikTok has said it will fight the law in court once it is signed into law.
“Finally, finally, finally. Tonight after more than six months of hard work, and many twists and turns in the road, America sends a message to the entire world: We will not turn our back on you,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said on the Senate floor moments before the vote.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., heralded Tuesday as “an important day for America” after months of GOP infighting over whether to keep funding Ukraine. McConnell said “we’ve turned the corner on the isolationist movement” and attributed the delay to two men: former Fox News anchor Tucker Carlson for his “demonization of Ukraine” and former President Donald Trump for his “mixed views” and earlier resistance to helping the country.
In pressing for the legislation, Biden directed his team to follow a strategy of sticking to substance, not politics, to get Ukraine aid over the finish line, an administration official said. That included staying in close contact with House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and his staff and laying off targeted attacks against him as much as possible while broadly urging House Republicans to act. It also mean emphasizing the intelligence picture and the national security risks of inaction for America, the official said.
Steve Ricchetti, a counselor to the president, said Biden's meeting with congressional leaders at the White House in February "really charted the course, and we left saying we have to get this done. Let’s deepen the dialogue about what we’re going to do to get there.”
Ricchetti added of Biden's role in the negotiations, “One of his superpowers is figuring out how to get these things done.”
Two months ago, the Senate voted 70-29 to pass a similar $95 billion foreign aid package — but without the TikTok provision. Still, the Senate proved receptive to the TikTok ban bill, which the House revised. An earlier House-passed bill would have given the parent company six months to sell TikTok, less than the current one.
Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., the chair of the Commerce Committee, endorsed the new bill, saying she’s “very happy” with the extended window for TikTok to be sold. Cantwell noted that she recommended the change.
"I support this updated legislation," she said.
Advocates for banning the app in the U.S. express concerns about TikTok’s relationship to ByteDance, a company based in Beijing, saying Americans’ data could, under Chinese law, be accessed by China’s government, a prospect that TikTok has downplayed, saying its headquarters are in Singapore and Los Angeles. They also claim China could manipulate the algorithm to advance propaganda.
A TikTok spokesperson responded to the House’s vote over the weekend by saying, “It is unfortunate that the House of Representatives is using the cover of important foreign and humanitarian assistance to once again jam through a ban bill that would trample the free speech rights of 170 million Americans, devastate 7 million businesses, and shutter a platform that contributes $24 billion to the U.S. economy annually.”
A source within TikTok shared an internal memo sent after the House passed the bill that said that once Biden signs it into law, it "will move to the courts for a legal challenge."
Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, lobbied his colleagues to reject the package, saying 41 senators could join to filibuster it.
“The $95 billion bill doesn’t have to pass. It takes only 41 senators stop it,” Lee wrote on X. “There are 49 Republicans in the Senate—more than enough. Where do your senators stand?”
In the end, he fell far short.
