US House Speaker Mike Johnson said on Monday that he will not bring the Senate's $95 billion foreign aid bill to the House floor for consideration if it reaches the lower chamber.
The Senate could pass the foreign aid bill as early as Wednesday.
"In the absence of having received any single border policy change from the Senate, the House will have to continue to work its own will on these important matters," Johnson said in a statement.
"House Republicans were crystal clear from the very beginning of discussions that any so-called national security supplemental legislation must recognize that national security begins at our own border," Johnson said in a statement.
Johnson said the Senate's foreign aid bill fails to address the United States' most pressing issue: border security. The House Speaker added that the Senate should have pushed to include meaningful border security measures in the $95 billion foreign aid bill, which includes approximately $60 billion for Ukraine, $14 billion for Israel and additional funding to address US national security concerns in the Indo-Pacific region.
Last week, Senate Republicans blocked a $118 billion national security supplemental package that includes $60 billion for Ukraine, $14 billion for Israel and border policy reforms. Republicans claim the reforms in the bill would not do enough to deter illegal immigration on the US southern border. The House Speaker also said that the bill would be "dead on arrival" if it reached the House of Representatives.
Johnson had previously stated that the Senate's previous bill, which included immigration policy changes widely regarded as the harshest curbs in decades but which he said still did not go far enough, would be "dead on arrival" in his chamber.
His rhetoric matched that of former president Donald Trump, who forcefully called for the bill to be rejected as he runs for office again and seeks to exploit Joe Biden's perceived weakness on immigration.
Despite months of bipartisan negotiations over the bill, Senate Republicans ultimately voted to block it from proceeding.
Another bill excluding the immigration provisions however gained enough support from Republicans to move forward in the Democratic-controlled Senate, making it almost certain it will pass a final simple-majority vote around midweek.
"The Senate did the right thing last week by rejecting the Ukraine-Taiwan-Gaza-Israel-Immigration legislation due to its insufficient border provisions, and it should have gone back to the drawing board to amend the current bill to include real border security provisions," Johnson said.
"Now, in the absence of having received any single border policy change from the Senate, the House will have to continue to work its own will on these important matters," he added.
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