Senate passes NATO expansion 95-1, Hawley votes no

The U.S. Senate has voted to approve NATO membership for both Finland and Sweden.

The 95-1 vote Wednesday represents a crucial step toward expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and its 73-year-old pact of mutual defense among the United States and democratic allies in Europe.

The only ‘no’ vote came from Missouri U.S. Senator Josh Hawley.

“We can do more in Europe … devote more resources, more firepower … or do what we need to do to deter Asia and China. We cannot do both,” Hawley said, calling his a “classic nationalist approach” to foreign policy.

“Our foreign policy should be about protecting the United States, our freedom, our people, and our way of life, and expanding NATO, I believe, would not do that,” said Senator Hawley. “What I am arguing for is the return to a classic nationalist approach to foreign policy […] grounded in our nation’s interests and in the reality of the world as it is, not as we wish it was.”

Missouri’s senior senator, Roy Blunt, spoke with a different tone. “I think it sends a signal to the world, and, hopefully, to all Americans, that not only is NATO important, but it will be stronger with Sweden and Finland than it has ever been. And I look forward to the opportunity to cast this vote today.”

“Now, they are not countries that have been on the sidelines, just hoping nothing would happen. They are countries that have significant defense capacities, significant military capabilities,” added Blunt.

Approval from all member nations — currently, 30 — is required. The candidacies of the two prosperous Northern European nations have won ratification from more than half of the NATO member nations in the roughly three months since the two applied.

It’s a purposely rapid pace meant to send a message to Russia over its six-month-old war against Ukraine’s West-looking government.

The Associated Press contributed to this report