Greene emerged from the extremist fringes of the Republican base, initially known for promoting the hysterical conspiracy theories of QAnon, an extremist ideology based on false claims. But her brief stint in office has catapulted her into the national spotlight; she has become an embodiment of the energies driving the right-wing movement in the United States. While there’s no uniform consensus within the Republican caucus on how to best support Ukraine, Greene represents as much of a constituency as more establishment figures like Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who has urged the Biden administration to deliver military aid to Kyiv at greater scale and speed.
And she may have reinforcements in Congress after Tuesday. A Republican-led House is expected to, among other things, turn up the heat on the Biden administration over its handling of the U.S. withdrawal of Afghanistan, as well as step up political pressure on Iran. But Ukraine may feel the pinch, too, given that Congress has already greenlit upward of $60 billion in aid and Kyiv is pleading for more from the West. It remains locked in an existential conflict with Russia, its cities struck by indiscriminate missile attacks, and whole communities displaced or besieged.
Ahead of the election, various GOP lawmakers and candidates have indicated the fire hose of funding needs to be turned off.
“I think people are gonna be sitting in a recession and they’re not going to write a blank check to Ukraine,” House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) recently told Punchbowl News. “They just won’t do it.”
“I think we’re at the point where we’ve given enough money in Ukraine, I really do. … The Europeans need to step up,” said J.D. Vance, the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate in Ohio. “And frankly, if the Ukrainians and the Europeans, more importantly, knew that America wasn’t going to foot the bill, they might actually step up.”
Marjorie Taylor Greene’s announcement that the GOP wouldn’t send any more money to Ukraine isn’t about cost. It’s about the rhetoric and her longstanding sympathy for Russia’s position. https://t.co/UzwVnVKYXw
— Philip Bump (@pbump) November 5, 2022
The current mood marks a striking departure from not-so-distant paradigms. For years, the Republicans have been the party more inclined to militarism and hawkish foreign policy. That arguably is still the case on numerous fronts, but the war in Ukraine has unraveled a curious seam in American politics. The Biden administration’s energetic and effective — at least, according to European diplomats in the U.S. capital — approach to bolstering Ukraine’s defense and rallying Western partners to its cause has created what seems an open-ended mission. President Biden and his allies all cast the fight for Ukraine as a fight for the future of democracy and the liberal order itself.
Meanwhile, Democrats on the left flank of their party struggle to even voice skepticism about the ongoing effort to back Ukraine’s prosecution of the war — a situation best illustrated last month by the tormented saga surrounding a mostly anodyne letter put forward by a bloc of progressive Democratic lawmakers that called on the Biden…
Read More: Ukrainians brace for winter, amid midterm elections that may change U.S. aid approach
