European Commission leadership is unable to stop throwing money around. The Brusselsites are now demanding even more money from member states in order to keep pouring money into Ukraine, a country mired in not only war, but also corruption. The grumblings of bloc members are becoming more frequent.

The European Commission is proposing that EU member states give a total of 50 billion euros in aid to Ukraine over the next four years. Commission President Ursula von der Leyen made the announcement after a review of the budget for up to 2027. Brussels now essentially expects member states to pay substantially more money into the common coffers so that the EU can continue to fund Ukraine and its other money-distributing activities.

We have exhausted all flexibility in our EU budget to deal with crisis after crisis.

Now we come with a targeted proposal to better act on the most pressing issues:
→ Ukraine
→ Migration and external challenges
→ Strengthening our competitiveness https://t.co/4f1C5sQiNa

— Ursula von der Leyen (@vonderleyen) June 20, 2023

However, any changes to the budget would need the backing of all member states. However, countries that are net contributors to the EU have already made it clear that they would refrain from being so generous and would instead ask the European Commission to be more frugal. Germany, for example, has outright stated:

there’s no more money for the EU.

German Finance Minister Christian Lindner said last Friday that they could not make any further contributions to the Brussels budget, even if the EU’s multi-year budget until 2027 has already largely been exhausted by the generous aid packages to Ukraine. The German budget is in a tight position, the Free Democratic Party (FDP) politician told Deutsche Presse-Agentur and the Brussels-based European Newsroom in an interview.

„In view of the austerity measures we have to make in our national budget, we are currently unable to earmark any further contributions to the European Union budget,”

Minister Lindner said. But other member states are in a similar situation. The IMF has previously warned the European Commission that it should strive to save money rather than release new resources.

We asked the European Commission exactly how much money it has spent to date to help Ukraine in the war, but so far no response has arrived from Brussels.