The legislative process in Congress can be a long and winding road, often marred by delays, detours and multi-car crashes. President Biden’s Oct. 9 request to Congress last year for $106 billion in emergency supplemental appropriations for security assistance to Israel, Ukraine, Taiwan and our southern border has been the victim of all of the above.

The request came in a nationally televised address from the Oval Office. The day after the address, the president’s press office issued a “Fact Sheet: White House Calls on Congress to Advance Critical National Security Priorities.”

The president may have thought that combining four disparate matters into a single bill would be strategically wise since most members could support at least one or two of the pieces and therefore be willing to go along with the rest. Instead of consolidate and conquer, however, the maneuver turned into a divide and defeat disaster. Congress is much more riven today than it was back when Sen. Joe Biden (D-Del.) was chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee (1987-95), or when he later chaired the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) took the first step by addressing the Israel piece of the president’s request. He had Appropriations’ Committee Chair Kay Granger (R-Texas) introduce the bill on Nov. 1, and called it up on the floor the next day; it passed, 226-196.

Johnson was already constrained by his own party colleagues from doing more. Former President........

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