Politics
In Ukraine, relief and rejoicing over U.S. aid vote
Ukrainians heaved a collective sigh of relief Sunday after the U.S. House of Representatives approved a long-sought $61 billion in aid, breaking a legislative logjam that had deepened hardships on the war’s front lines, and made it difficult for Ukrainian forces to fend off Russian attacks on civilian neighborhoods and critical infrastructure.
However, with a fresh infusion of aid ready to be rushed in as soon as the Senate approves the measure and President Biden signs the measure into law — both expected to happen by midweek — it may now take some time to determine whether Russian forces’ battlefield momentum of recent months can be reversed, analysts said.
And Ukrainians were braced for at least a short-term redoubling of the near-nightly pummeling of cities and towns across the country with missiles and drones — which in recent weeks was exacerbated by an alarming depletion of Ukrainian air defenses. An angry Russia could try to get in more punishing attacks before more air-defense help arrives, some feared.
“First of all — thank you, thank you,” said Anastasia Chuchin, 36, who was hurrying to catch a train on a rain-soaked morning in the capital, Kyiv. “We’re very grateful for this assistance. But we may still have some really hard days ahead of us.”
President Volodymyr Zelensky issued a statement of appreciation moments after the vote, which occurred late Saturday evening Ukraine time. He thanked by name House Speaker Mike Johnson, the Louisiana Republican who had been heavily lobbied by Ukraine’s supporters to bring the measure to a vote despite bitter opposition from his party’s far-right flank.
“This is a life-saving decision,” Zelensky said in a Saturday night address to the country in which he expressed gratitude to all those in the United States who, “like us in Ukraine, feel that Russian evil definitely should not prevail.”
Just as important in that initial reaction was what Zelensky did not say. The Ukrainian leader carefully refrained from alluding to Ukrainians’ frustrations over how long it had taken to move the aid measure forward — or to widespread fears here that American assistance might be on the verge of drying up altogether, particularly if former President Trump, the Republican nominee, wins back the White House in November.
In an interview aired Sunday, though, the Ukrainian leader took a starker tone about setbacks directly tied to the fact that “the process stalled for half a year.”
“We had losses …. in men, in equipment,” he said on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” particularly citing the deteriorating situation in Ukraine’s Donbas region, its industrial heartland.
“The east was very difficult, and we did lose the initiative,” he acknowledged. “Now we have the chance to stabilize this situation.”
As the political infighting dragged on in Washington, Ukrainian officials expressed particular alarm over the systematic destruction of crucial energy infrastructure, such as a power plant wrecked by missiles outside Kyiv this month. In some parts of the country, the targeting of electricity-generating plants has caused power cuts of a scope and duration comparable to those seen much earlier in the war.
U.S. defense officials have not provided a detailed breakdown of what will be in the first tranche of assistance, but the first order of business will likely be to replenish stores of munitions used by Ukrainian forces along a front line that stretches for hundreds of miles, arcing through the country’s south and east. Field units have reported rationing artillery shells and precision rockets even as Russian troops mount an aggressive push in places like the key eastern town of Chasiv Yar.
Speaking on CBS’ “Face the Nation” on Sunday, Sen. Mark R. Warner (D-Va.), head of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said he was confident the U.S. would be able to resume shipments of equipment by the end of the week.
“This should have happened six months ago,” Warner said of the House vote to approve the aid. “The next best time is now, this week. … If [Ukrainians] don’t have the materiels, they can’t carry this fight to the Russians.”
U.S. and Ukrainian officials said resupply efforts could take place relatively quickly, because of supply chains and logistical networks established early in the more than two-year-old conflict. Some of those could be reactivated within days.
Even so, the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, noted that “Ukrainian forces may suffer additional setbacks in the coming weeks” while waiting for the arrival of weaponry that will allow them to stabilize the front lines.
While Russia has not managed any major battlefield breakthroughs since capturing the eastern town of Avdiivka in February, independent military analysts had reported steady incremental advances, amounting to hundreds of square miles of territory, that could have left Ukrainians hard-pressed to contain a concerted Russian push.
With the imminent arrival of aid, though, Ukrainian forces “will likely be able to blunt the current Russian offensive assuming the resumed U.S. assistance arrives promptly,” the institute said.
Russia, predictably, hammered on what has become a key talking point — that U.S. assistance would do little more than prolong a bloody confrontation. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov also suggested that the main idea behind the package was to funnel money to U.S. weapons manufacturers.
The House vote “will make the United States of America richer, further ruin Ukraine and result in the deaths of even more Ukrainians, the fault of the Kyiv regime,” Peskov said, according to official Russian media.
Some U.S. lawmakers said coming to Ukraine’s aid now had helped avert sending a dangerous signal of U.S. weakness to Moscow.
“If we surrender Ukraine like we did Afghanistan, which was a debacle, will the United States be weaker or stronger?” Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said on ABC’s “This Week with George Stephanopoulos.”
“We were running out of time,” McCaul said. “Ukraine was about to fall.”
In the NBC interview, Zelensky said the passage of the bill would send a powerful message to Russia that Washington stands by Kyiv, and that the war would not devolve into “a second Afghanistan.”
“I think this support will really strengthen the armed forces of Ukraine, and we will have a chance for victory,” Zelensky said through an interpreter.
European allies, for their part, had watched the drawn-out aid drama with mounting anxiety and exasperation. But most quickly pivoted to public expressions of optimism and unity.
“Ukraine is using the weapons provided by NATO Allies to destroy Russian combat capabilities. This makes us all safer, in Europe & North America,” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg posted on the platform X.
A few, including Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, could not suppress a slightly sardonic tone even in expressing relief. NATO allies that feel more directly threatened by Russia, including the Baltic states and Poland, have long viewed the conflict with a sense of crisis and urgency, and were at times incredulous as U.S. support appeared to flag.
“Better late than too late,” Tusk wrote crisply on X, referring to the long-delayed House vote. “And I hope it is not too late for Ukraine.”
Many Ukrainians, whose days and nights are punctuated by air alerts that send people scurrying into basement bunkers or taking makeshift shelter behind a “second wall” at home, were eager to make the point that not only their own safety was at stake.
“This is a recognition that helping us in our fight against Russia and [Russian President Vladimir] Putin helps Europe, helps democracy, helps the entire whole world,” Dmytro Laba, a 36-year-old IT specialist in Kyiv, said of the House vote. “Even the United States of America.”
King reported from Kyiv and Wilkinson from Washington.
Politics
Georgia Republicans head to runoff in secretary of state race defined by 2020 election claims
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!
Vernon Jones and Tim Fleming are heading to a runoff after neither claimed at least 50% of the vote in Georgia’s Republican primary for secretary of state on Tuesday.
The Republican field included Jones, Fleming, Gabriel Sterling, Kelvin King and Ted Metz, while Democrats Cam Ashling, Dana Barrett, Adrian Consonery Jr. and Penny Brown Reynolds competed for their party’s nomination for Georgia’s top election officer.
The race underscored how disputes stemming from the 2020 presidential election, including claims from President Donald Trump that the contest was stolen, continue to shape debates over voting laws and election security years later.
2026 MIDTERMS: PRIMARIES, KEY RACES AND ELECTION RESULTS
The winner of the runoff on June 16 will advance to the general election in November, where control of the office overseeing voter registration, election certification and ballot administration is expected to remain a closely watched issue in one of the nation’s most competitive battleground states.
Sterling, Georgia’s former chief operating officer in the secretary of state’s office, entered the race with statewide name recognition after publicly defending Georgia’s handling of the 2020 election.
Jones, a former Democratic state lawmaker turned Trump ally, campaigned as a staunch supporter of the president and emerged as a fierce critic of the state’s election system.
REPORTER’S NOTEBOOK: DEMOCRATS SAY THEY CAN STILL FLIP THE HOUSE DESPITE GOP REDISTRICTING GAINS IN THE SOUTH
Vernon Jones, a former Democratic state lawmaker turned Republican ally of President Donald Trump, ran in Georgia’s GOP primary for secretary of state. (Elijah Nouvelage/Bloomberg/Getty Images)
King is a general contractor who previously ran for U.S. Senate and is married to State Election Board member and conservative commentator Janelle King.
Fleming previously worked in the secretary of state’s office when current Republican Gov. Brian Kemp held the position. The former chairman of the Georgia Republican Party pitched himself as a conservative focused on tightening election procedures.
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP
Candidates in Georgia’s secretary of state race are competing to oversee elections in one of the nation’s most closely watched battleground states. (Dustin Chambers/Bloomberg/Getty Images)
Metz, the Libertarian Party’s 2022 gubernatorial nominee, also joined the GOP primary field.
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, a Republican who drew national attention after rejecting efforts to overturn the state’s 2020 presidential election results, is running for governor.
This is a developing story. Check back for the latest election results and updates.
WASHINGTON — In the latest escalation of a fight over the use of paid social media creators, Tom Steyer’s campaign for governor filed a complaint Tuesday accusing influencers who posted content supportive of Xavier Becerra’s campaign of failing to disclose that they had been paid, which is required by California law.
One of the two influencers accused, however, said she had not been paid by the Becerra campaign to create posts supporting his candidacy.
The complaint, filed with California’s Fair Political Practices Commission, accuses Jay Gonzalez of producing at least 14 pro-Becerra posts on Instagram and Facebook in late April and early May, after he was hired by the campaign, and only belatedly editing the posts to acknowledge they had been sponsored by the campaign.
The complaint also said that a social media creator named Maggie Reed, who posts under the username mermaidmamamaggie, created four pro-Becerra posts on Instagram and had previously offered to create paid posts for another gubernatorial campaign.
The complaint alleges that Becerra’s campaign failed to disclose payments to both influencers in its campaign filings.
But Reed said she had not been paid by the Becerra campaign for her posts.
“I have never accepted, nor have I been offered, money from Xavier Becerra’s campaign. I endorsed Becerra because of his policies and proven track record,” Reed said in a statement.
The Becerra campaign maintained that it has not paid influencers who have created posts in support of the campaign.
“All of the content you see online is entirely and purely organic,” said Becerra spokesman Jonathan Underland.
Becerra and Steyer have been the top two Democratic candidates in recent polling for the governor’s race, with Becerra consistently maintaining a slight edge in those polls.
The complaint by Steyer’s campaign comes after two influencers who support Becerra filed a complaint last week accusing social media creators hired by the Steyer campaign of failing to disclose that they had been paid to produce their posts.
The campaign of the billionaire candidate for governor had previously disclosed payments to some influencers with large audiences, including one creator with the user name zayydante, who has 1.8 million followers on TikTok, and another with the user name littleyeg, who has nearly 350,000 followers on TikTok. The complaint filed last week said that both of these influencers failed to disclose that they had been paid by the campaign to produce content.
The complaint also highlighted several accounts created by user who don’t appear to live in California who created posts promoting Steyer and, in at least one case, posted elsewhere that they had been paid by the campaign.
The influencers who filed the original complaint said they saw the newly filed complaint as an attempt by Steyer’s campaign to deflect criticism.
“All he’s done is attack his opponent instead of taking accountability for violating the law,” said Kaitlyn Hennessy, one of the two influencers who filed the complaint against Steyer’s campaign. Hennessy and the other influencer who filed the complaint both said they have not been paid by the Becerra campaign.
In a post on Substack, Steyer defended his campaign’s use of paid social media influencers and said that it had been transparent about their use.
“Every creator we compensate has been and will be publicly disclosed as required by law,” he wrote.
Under a California law passed in 2023, social media creators who create paid content on behalf of a political campaign are required to disclose in their post that the material was sponsored and who paid for it.
The onus is on creators to provide the disclosure, but campaigns are required to notify influencers they hire of the requirement.
Violation of the rules doesn’t trigger criminal, civil or administrative penalties but the FPPC can take alleged offenders to court and ask a judge to force compliance with the law.
Politics
JD Vance says Trump is ‘locked and loaded’ to restart military campaign against Iran if nuclear talks fail
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!
Vice President JD Vance said Tuesday that President Donald Trump is still pursuing a diplomatic deal with Iran but remains “locked and loaded” to restart the military campaign if nuclear talks collapse.
“It takes two to tango,” Vance told reporters at a White House press briefing. “We are not going to have a deal that allows the Iranians to have a nuclear weapon.
“So as the president just told me, we’re locked and loaded,” Vance added. “We don’t want to go down that pathway. But the president is willing and able to go down that pathway if we have to.”
The administration sees two paths forward, according to Vance: a negotiated agreement that permanently blocks Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, or renewed U.S. military action.
VANCE WARNS IRAN THAT ‘ANOTHER OPTION ON THE TABLE’ IF NUCLEAR DEAL NOT REACHED
Vice President JD Vance spoke during a news conference on anti-fraud initiatives in the Indian Treaty Room of the Eisenhower Executive Office Building on May 13, 2026, in Washington, D.C. The Trump administration warned states they could lose Medicaid funding if they fail to comply with federal anti-fraud statutes. (Daniel Heuer/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
“We think the Iranians want to make a deal,” Vance said. “The president of the United States has asked us to negotiate in good faith. And that’s exactly what we’ve done.”
But Vance warned that diplomacy will not come at the cost of Trump’s core demand that Tehran never obtain a nuclear weapon.
“There’s an option B, and the option B is that we could restart the military campaign to continue to prosecute the case, to continue to try to achieve America’s objectives,” Vance said. “But that’s not what the president wants. And I don’t think it’s what the Iranians want either.”
TRUMP WARNS IRAN’S ‘CLOCK IS TICKING’: MOVE ‘FAST’ OR ‘THERE WON’T BE ANYTHING LEFT’
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks to members of the media after returning to the White House on May 15, 2026 in Washington, DC. President Trump is returning to Washington from his trip to China, where he and President Xi addressed ways to enhance bilateral economic cooperation and investment, and agreed that Iran should not be allowed to have a nuclear weapon. ( (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
The exchange came after Trump said he was just an hour away from ordering fresh attacks on Iran on Monday night.
“We were getting ready to do a very major attack [Tuesday], and I put it off for a little while — hopefully maybe forever,” Trump said, “because we’ve had very big discussions with Iran, and we’ll see what they amount to.”
“There seems to be a very good chance that they can work something out,” Trump told reporters at the White House. “If we can do that without bombing the hell out of them, I’d be very happy.”
The announcement marked the latest shift in Trump’s handling of the fragile ceasefire reached in mid-April. For weeks, the president has warned Iran that fighting could resume if it did not accept a deal, while repeatedly setting deadlines and then backing away from them.
Ships are anchored in the Strait of Hormuz off Bandar Abbas in southern Iran on May 4. A report on May 15 said a ship was seized off the coast of the United Arab Emirates and is being brought toward Iranian waters. (Amirhossein Khorgooei/ISNA/AFP via Getty Images)
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP
Over the weekend, Trump warned that “the Clock is Ticking” and said Iran needed to move “FAST, or there won’t be anything left of them.”
Trump first disclosed the pause in a social media post Monday, saying he had ordered the U.S. military to be ready “to go forward with a full, large scale assault of Iran, on a moment’s notice” if an acceptable deal is not reached.
-
Washington2 minutes ago
Washington Lottery Mega Millions, Cash Pop results for May 19, 2026
-
Wisconsin8 minutes agoWisconsin Lottery Mega Millions, Pick 3 results for May 19, 2026
-
West Virginia14 minutes agoThis week in West Virginia history
-
Wyoming20 minutes agoWyoPreps’ 2026 Wyoming High School Track and Field State Championship Preview
-
Crypto26 minutes agoK33 Research Says Bitcoin’s $60K Bottom Was Bear Market’s Maximum Drawdown
-
Finance31 minutes agoElections Board Rule Could Limit Public Access to Campaign Finance Complaints
-
Fitness38 minutes agoLeast fit people need to do more exercise than fittest to get same benefit – study
-
Movie Reviews50 minutes agoJack Ryan: Ghost War review – Amazon’s Tom Clancy series spawns middling movie
