Knowing a vote on another aid package for Ukraine threatens his future, Representative Chuck Edwards, a freshman Republican, has spent part of the past week traveling around the country to see firsthand how the American dollars in the country’s fight to expel the Russian invaders. .
What he witnessed as he and a bipartisan group of lawmakers traveled across Ukraine for four days — a dozen airstrikes, a drone strike, and sites of horrific atrocities against civilians — the one who left Mr. Edwards and his colleagues vow to pressure Speaker Mike Johnson to push a bill to provide more aid for the war effort.
They told President Volodymyr Zelensky that their visit had given them a “new appreciation” for what his country was facing, Mr. Edwards said, and that they would lobby Mr. Johnson to ensure that American aid does not dry up.
The trip comes at a critical time for Ukraine aid on Capitol Hill, as Mr. Johnson is looking for a path to push through a new funding package for the embattled country amid fierce opposition from his right wing. The fate of the effort depends in part on key Republicans like Mr. Edwards, who previously voted in favor of aid to Ukraine, who are willing to join Democrats in lending their support to the cause.
In an interview with The New York Times, Mr. Edwards, who last month easily overcome a major challenge to his right from a candidate who opposed US aid to Ukraine, discussed the urgency of supporting the war effort there, what he saw on his journeyand the difficult politics of the issue.
This interview has been edited and shortened for length and clarity.
Why did you decide to go to Ukraine?
The news is really breaking in America with what is happening in Ukraine. It’s taken a back seat to so many other things, other issues that are important here in the country. And knowing that Ukraine is running against a deadline, I thought it was important for me to go and participate in a fact-finding mission and get a better firsthand account of what’s actually going on there , as we approach the critical and important decision of whether — or how — the US should help Ukraine.
What are your main takeaways?
At the highest level, the conclusion I came to was that Ukraine would either continue to be a democracy or it would fall into the hands of a Marxist, socialist, murderous dictatorship. And it won’t — it won’t — remain a democracy if the United States doesn’t intervene.
Ukraine has a good base of strong men and women who are ready to step up and defend their country. They don’t have the resources to do it. President Zelensky told me about several brigades — I will not mention the number, but a number of brigades — with men but no equipment. They carry 10 Russian shells each which they can return. And if they don’t receive equipment and ammunition soon, their democracy will collapse.
The stories of the inhumanity that took place there — it was very brutal and horrible. And the United States has always stood for freedom and liberty and justice. And it would be a travesty for us to take a back seat and allow that to happen. What I think I see happening in Ukraine today is what happened before World War II.
Is there a particular story that really stood out to you?
In the village of Bucha, 136 old men, women and children are crammed into a very small basement of a school. It’s dark, dank, musty, musty, nasty. And they were forced to live there for 27 days. People are dying. They pile bodies in the corner.
I had the opportunity to stand in that corner and see the dead and rotting bodies. And one story that stuck out in particular was where a woman said there was a 7-year-old child in that basement who was clearly dying. He will soon be among the dead. He is sick. He has a fever. He is hurt. He panicked. The prisoners in that basement went upstairs knocking on the door and got the attention of the Russian soldiers and the one who answered the door was: “Let him die. This is war.”
I think that statement alone illustrates the brutality of what is happening now and why Putin needs to be stopped. And he made it clear that he will not stop in Ukraine.
His purpose is very clear, and the world is watching. Our enemies are watching. They watched the horrors of the exodus from Afghanistan. They watched the Biden White House sit back and allow this invasion of Ukraine to take place. China is certainly looking to see how we respond. North Korea is watching. America now has an opportunity to show that we are still a superpower. That we won’t let the bullies take over those people in the world who can’t defend themselves.
There are questions about whether Speaker Johnson will even allow Ukraine aid to receive a vote in the House. Do you have a message for President Zelensky about what the Chamber might do?
I cannot speak for the House in general. But the message to President Zelensky from the six members of the congressional delegation that went there was, that we have a new appreciation for the hardship the country is going through, and we are going back to the United States and trying to convince. Speaker Johnson and others to come forward and support Ukraine.
I wonder what you hear from your constituents back home about this and how you talk about it with them. Your main challenger was against sending aid to Ukraine — and you stood up and made the argument for it.
I surveyed the people in my district. And they favor, three-to-one, helping Ukraine. Some folks, I don’t believe are totally against helping, but they insist that we need to pay attention to what’s happening right here in America. We need to secure our own borders; that we need to pay attention to the debt we have in America today.
So I don’t believe they are strictly opposed. They’re just insisting that we face our own problems, too — and they’re right. I believe we can still continue both. Joe Biden really needs to reverse the 64 executive actions he took that relaxed and helped open our border. That can be dealt with as a separate issue.
I believe there is a way for us to responsibly help Ukraine. There are Russian properties that can be acquired. One of the main takeaways I have after leaving Ukraine and meeting with the US ambassador to Ukraine, is that US sanctions against Russia and world sanctions against Russia are not working. Any war is fought on many fronts. Stifling Putin’s revenues — oil revenue, banking revenue — is another area where we can fight this war.
Your argument for why the US should continue sending aid to Ukraine strikes me as a very traditional GOP argument, but it is not the prevailing view in your party at the moment. Think you’re in the minority on this issue?
I believe that most of the conference, and most of Congress will side with my argument. I believe America is capable of walking and chewing gum.
We are now at a point where we have to do that, because the situation in Ukraine has become very bad. We don’t have the luxury of waiting until we fix all our problems. We will have to work on them simultaneously.
