'Joe Biden has been asking for this money since October'

  • 6 months ago

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Transcript
00:00Well, $95 billion worth of aid, it breaks down to roughly $61 billion for Ukraine, $26
00:07for Israel, $8 for the Indo-Pacific and then of course that extra bill that was mainly
00:12around TikTok but also sanctions on Iran and also freeing up some Russian assets for the
00:18use of Ukraine as well.
00:19That all put together in one big package by the House when it was sent to the Senate.
00:25Very similar, it must be said, to what the Senate gave to the House two months ago and
00:30the Senate basically sat on.
00:32Joe Biden has been asking for this money since October and now he finally has it.
00:36He's called it My Legislation that was passed.
00:40That was a statement that came out after the vote.
00:42He also thanked lawmakers for answering what he called history's call at this critical
00:48inflection point and said that the U.S. will begin sending weapons and equipment to Ukraine
00:53this week.
00:54He follows up reporting that we've had that the Pentagon was preparing a $1 billion package
00:59worth of arms and munitions to send to Ukraine.
01:03We don't know exactly what that breakdown is but we have heard that it will include
01:07vehicles as well as stinger and interceptor missiles, also artillery, long-range capabilities
01:12such as the HIMARS system and also some small arms munitions as well.
01:17Now the U.S. has these weapons stores in Europe so it can get these munitions to Ukraine very
01:24quickly indeed within a couple of days it should be said and that will be the first
01:27delivery that the U.S. has given to Ukraine since December.
01:31So long-awaited and obviously it's been long-awaited in Kyiv as well.
01:36Vladimir Zelensky has thanked U.S. lawmakers for passing this.
01:41He said that the vote reinforces America's role as a beacon of democracy and a leader
01:45of the free world.
01:46No doubt a sigh of relief being breathed in Kyiv this morning.
01:51And another thing in this legislation is the long-anticipated law forcing the Chinese company
01:56ByteDance to sell TikTok or face a ban on the social media platform in the U.S.
02:02This naturally is seen contentiously in China but there are also ramifications in the U.S. itself.
02:10Yes of course.
02:11Now the U.S. lawmakers have long argued that TikTok was a danger especially for the young
02:17people in American society mainly over data privacy concerns that the Chinese Communist
02:22Party could access this information that is held by ByteDance but TikTok is a very popular
02:28social media network here in the United States.
02:31It has 170 million users that is roughly half of the population here and this bill now calls
02:38for the company ByteDance to divest this to an American company and gives it just nine
02:44months to do so.
02:45Now lawmakers think that is a time frame which is achievable but some analysts say that is
02:49not going to be achievable although that could be extended for another three months as well.
02:55Now TikTok like I said massively popular but especially among the younger votes and it
02:59is that younger votes that both Donald Trump and Joe Biden are trying to reach as we head
03:05into the election in November.
03:07A recent poll came out saying that the young voters care about where the U.S. is going.
03:13Quite a big chunk of them believe that the U.S. is off the path.
03:17They care about the economy.
03:18They care about Israel Hamas and Biden so far is ahead by about 8 percent.
03:24But when you whistle that down to likely voters he's ahead by 19 percent.
03:29That's among under 30s and they care a lot about TikTok and what's going to happen about
03:34it so much so that Joe Biden has started a TikTok campaign to try to reach these younger
03:39voters.
03:40So if you look at the videos that that campaign is posting on TikTok all of the comments now
03:45are about are about this ban.
03:48So it's something that could affect the election there among the younger voters as we head
03:52into November.

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