Washington, February 01: Republicans on Capitol Hill largely are supporting the Obama administration’s take-it-slow approach on the crisis in Egypt, with one notable exception — Sen. Rand Paul, the face of the GOP’s “tea party” wing.
House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio and Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky both endorsed the White House’s actions in talk-show interviews Sunday.
“I don’t have any criticism of President Obama or Secretary [Hillary] Clinton at this point,” McConnell said on NBC’s Meet the Press. “I mean, they know full well that we can’t give the Egyptians advice about who their leadership is. That’s beyond the reach of the United States. And I think we ought to speak as one voice during this crisis.”
“Our administration so far has handled this situation pretty well,” Boehner said on Fox News. “Reforms need to occur in Egypt. And frankly, any place around the world where people are calling out for freedom [and] democracy, I think we have a responsibility to respond.”
Boehner called for more democratic reforms in the strife-torn country, while saying the U.S. must continue to support the regime of President Hosni Mubarak. “What we don’t want are radical ideologies to take control of a very large and important country in the Middle East,” Boehner said.
Sen. John McCain of Arizona, the former GOP presidential candidate, said, also backed Obama’s response, but said the U.S. needed to push harder for reform. “I think the president needs to be a little farther ahead.”
Speaking Sunday on CNN, McCain said “It was clear for a long time that the kind of oppressive regime that Mubarak controls, that sooner or later there was going to be great difficulties.”
McCain called for “free and open elections” in September. “You cannot have autocratic or oppressive regimes last forever,” he said. “We’ve got to be on the right side of history here.”
“Let’s get out in front of this issue,” McCain said.
But in a further example of the tensions underlying the GOP as a whole and its more isolationist “tea party” faction, Paul, the recently elected senator from Kentucky, late last week called for an end to all foreign aid, including to Egypt and Israel, both key U.S. allies in the Middle East, as a means to shrink the federal budget.
“When you send foreign aid, you actually send quite a bit to Israel’s enemies,” Paul said in an interview on CNN. “You have to ask yourself: Are we funding an arms race on both sides?”
Paul did not specifically address cutting off the billions in aid to Egypt. Israel and Egypt have been strategic partners in the region for decades.
Secretary Clinton on Sunday denied reports that the U.S. was examining suspending military and economic aid to Egypt, which after Israel receives the most U.S. dollars of any nation. Some pro-democracy groups have advocated canceling the aid to put further pressure on Mubarak.
Some Democrats pounced on Paul’s words. “It is shocking that Senator Paul wants our nation to renege on our commitment to a vital ally, which is necessary to assure Israel’s continued qualitative military advantage in a dangerous region,” Rep. Nita Lowey of New York said in a statement. “It is unclear to me whether Rand Paul speaks for the tea party, the Republican Party, or simply himself.”
And freshman Republican Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, who has close ties to the tea party, over the weekend reaffirmed his support for aid to Israel.
But as far as Egypt is concerned, Paul isn’t entirely alone in his views. Earlier this month, the Republican Study Committee, the conservative policy arm of the House Republicans, released a budget-slashing blueprint that called for elimination of $250 million in annual U.S. economic aid to the country.
“Since 1979, United States taxpayers have spent more than $50 billion on foreign aid to Egypt,” the committee’s report said. “Unfortunately, U.S. foreign aid dollars have not led to an improvement in Egypt’s human rights record or to economic liberalization.”
But the RSC would preserve the more than $1 billion in aid to the Egyptian military, which constitutes the bulk of the U.S. assistance.
–Agencies