The Republican Party has politicized critical US aid to Ukraine, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says the radical rhetoric terrifies his people.”There are definitely some voices, radical voices from the Republican party, and they are straining Ukrainian society,” Zelenskyy said during a group interview at Davos on Tuesday with outlets including Business Insider.”Sometimes we are surprised, and sometimes society is just afraid,” he said. The Ukrainian leader said that he reckons that “risqué slogans” are just a part of US politics. But, he continued, “it’s so painful for people in Ukraine, it’s so sensitive.””During the war, you know, everything is more painful,” Zelenskyy added.”Some radical voices are just stressing us out. They’re scaring the public,” he said. “That’s why I really want it very much to be just the opinion of singular voices and not that of a large part of the Republicans.”Zelenskyy appeared to be referring to a contingent of GOP lawmakers who have loudly denounced US support for Ukraine, as well as Republicans in Congress who have been holding a roughly $111 billion aid package hostage since October 2023 in order to pass stricter border and immigration policies.Some of the more vocal opponents of sending more money to Kyiv, such as Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, told 60 Minutes in April 2023, that “Ukraine is not the 51st state of the United States.” Greene said the US should instead be focusing on its out of control debt and immigration.
Others House GOP officials, like Rep. Lauren Boebert, have said that the US has already sent too much money and suggested that it doesn’t know where that aid is actually going.That type of inflammatory rhetoric, along with the current roadblock in Congress, has put Ukraine on edge.The US is by far the biggest single contributor of security assistance to Ukraine, and turning off the tap could spell, as Zelenskyy has warned, disaster for Ukraine’s on the battlefield. It could have other consequences, he has said, including the an emboldened Russia starting conflicts with other nations.
Members of the SPG-9 anti tank recoilless gun crew fire the gun onto Russian positions near the occupied Ukrainian city of Bakhmut on August 14, 2023, in Donetsk Oblast, Ukraine.
Roman Chop/Global Images Ukraine via Getty Images
But Zelenskyy appears to recognize that strong rhetoric, no matter how hurtful or problematic, is just part of how US politics work, particularly in election years.Zelenskyy said that when he actually meets with US lawmakers, both Democrats and Republicans, much of that falls away.”This is because of what I feel — when I’m in the United States, or when members of the Congress, senators, representatives of both parties visit us, and they sit at the table with me, and we talk, and I’ve never heard of no aid whatsoever.”Out in the open, though, the rhetoric remains, and aid to Ukraine is still in danger.Global Editor-in-Chief Nicholas Carlson contributed to this report.
