As congressional Republicans criticized President Biden over the chaotic withdrawal from Kabul, the US Senate passed on Tuesday legislation to provide aid for Americans returning from Afghanistan that Biden signed it into law, The Jerusalem Post reports.
The Senate session in the nearly empty Senate chamber was presided over by Vice President Kamala Harris, which was highly unusual, while the bill passed by unanimous consent with no objections was announced by Democratic Senator Ben Cardin.
Cardin said the legislation provides more funds to take care the necessities on a short-term base of Americans who have been brought home from Afghanistan after living there for years.
Republican Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas said Harris’s presiding over the Senate on Tuesday is another evidence of the Biden administration admitting the pullout debacle the US President is solely responsible for.
Though it was not immediately clear how the money would be used, the Emergency Repatriation Assistance for Returning Americans Act provides $10 million in emergency funds for each of the fiscal years 2021 and 2022 to provide emergency repatriation assistance to affected individuals.
More than 5,500 5,500 Americans were evacuated from Afghanistan in the final weeks of the American mission with fewer than 200 Americans remaining in the country waiting to leave.
According to CBS News, from Afghanistan on US military flights in the final weeks of the American mission with fewer than 200 Americans remaining in the country waiting to leave.
House Republicans also plan to bring up their own legislation Tuesday in a pro forma House session that would call on the Biden administration to produce a plan to repatriate stranded Americans, measure the Democrats are likely to block and which can only pass by unanimous consent due to the summer recess.
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