War in Ukraine: Who Are the 8 Republicans to Vote Against Suspending Trade With Russia?
In surprising news to no one, this group of the usual outliers voted against suspending normal trade relations with Russia.
After an emotional plea to Congress from Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky, eight House Republicans chose to vote against suspending normal trade relations with Russia.
In a rare bipartisan block of solidarity, the House voted overwhelmingly (424 to 8) in support of stripping Russia of its preferential trade status with the U.S.
The vote involved raising tariffs on imports from Russia and Belarus (a supporter of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine) and it gives President Biden the power to impose stricter taxes on Russian goods.
Zelensky gave a heartfelt speech
Before the vote, Congress listened to a virtual speech from Zelensky. Somehow, these eight lawmakers sat and listened to Zelensky’s speech, watched the videos depicting a destroyed Ukraine filled with crying children, shattered buildings, and bodies in the streets, and yet, decided that trade relations should continue as usual.
The U.S. has already banned the importation of Russian oil, liquefied natural gas, and other products. This new vote means imports of other Russian goods such as aluminum, steel, and plywood will become more expensive.
Zelensky ended his speech to Congress with a direct appeal to President Biden and members of Congress when he said, “Being the leader of the world means to be the leader of peace.”
Who voted no to being a leader of peace?
These eight GOP Representatives:
- Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia
- Lauren Boebert of Colorado
- Matt Gaetz of Florida
- Chip Roy of Texas
- Andy Biggs of Arizona
- Glenn Grothman of Wisconsin
- Dan Bishop of North Carolina
- Thomas Massie of Kentucky
What explanations did they provide for voting against anti-war measures in the brutal and deadly invasion of Ukraine?
Marjorie Taylor Greene says Ukraine can’t win anyway
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, for one, posted on Facebook that she doesn’t see the point of providing funding when she believes Ukraine will lose anyway. She said, “If we truly care about suffering and death on our television screens, we cannot fund more of it by sending money and weaponry to fight a war they cannot possibly win!”
Remember, this is the same woman that believes in space lasers, the same woman that once suggested Nancy Pelosi should be executed for treason, and the very person who doesn’t believe there is evidence that a plane crashed into the Pentagon on 9/11. “It’s odd,” she once said, “there’s never any evidence shown for a plane in the Pentagon.”
(Sorry Marjorie, but I happen to have seen the gaping hole in the Pentagon where the plane crashed with my very own eyes shortly after the attack occurred. Believe me, there is evidence.)
As for a Ukrainian victory being a lost cause, one retired general disagrees. He explained on the website of the Center for European Analysis that he believes the Russians are running out of time. “The Russians are in trouble, and they know it,” he stated in the article.
Matt Gaetz and his legal problems
Another no voter, Rep. Matt Gaetz, had this to say a month ago during the Conservative Political Action Conference in Orlando, Florida. “Why should Americans have to pay the costs for freedom elsewhere when our own leaders won’t stand up for our freedom here?”
Of course, you may know Gaetz better as the man currently being investigated by a federal grand jury for sex-trafficking a 17-year-old.
Grothman is worried about abortion and LGBTQ
Grothman said in a floor speech on Friday regarding his vote,
“The president will have a new tool in his toolbox if he wants to force other countries to adapt the views of abortion and the views of LGBTQ that are the views, quite frankly, of the left wing of the Democratic Party. The President will be able to threaten the parliaments, or for all I know, lobbyists, demonstrators in foreign countries, by saying you can’t get a visa to the United States because we don’t like your stance on abortion, we don’t like your stance on LGBTQ.”
Two of the lawmakers also voted against making lynching a federal hate crime
For the record, Roy and Massie also opposed The Emmett Till Antilynching Act, which would make lynching a federal hate crime. The bill had unanimous support except for those two and Rep. Andrew Clyde of Georgia. According to Massie, the bill would “endanger other liberties such as freedom of speech.” Roy called the bill “an effort to advance a woke agenda.”
Now Roy wouldn’t be the first person ever to think anti-lynching efforts are part of a “woke agenda.” It’s just that the other guys with similar opinions are hard to identify. Mainly because of the white pointy hoods they wear to obscure their faces.
On the other side of the GOP…
Ted Cruz has a short memory.
Many GOP lawmakers are calling for Biden to do more and blaming him for the war in the first place. Sen. Ted Cruz, told CBS News, “The reason that Russia is invading Ukraine is because of enormous mistakes that the Biden administration has made, and two in particular.”
Cruz and other GOP members seem to have completely forgotten former President Trump’s constant undermining of NATO, his threats to withdraw from NATO, and his love affair with Putin, including the time he sided with Putin over his own government’s intelligence agency.
Ukraine fights for its very existence
And here we are amid bickering, fighting, and finger-pointing in Congress watching a country besieged by the efforts from Russia, not to merely win a war, but to wipe the country and its people off of the globe entirely. Russia is systematically attacking the country, its culture, its history, and its citizens.
Congress members like Gaetz and Greene will take any opportunity to create a stir, to go against the grain, to get their name trending on social media. But after viewing footage from CNN of a mother crying in the streets over her child’s dead body, after seeing a pregnant woman carried on a stretcher as she holds her stomach and learning later she and the baby both died, after hearing about evacuation routes being bombed as families attempt to flee to safety, it becomes increasingly difficult to stomach the far-right’s constant power grabs, attention-seeking, and desperate attempts at Trump-like behavior.
Politico collected the responses of the eight that voted no. If you’d like to read them in full, here they are.
As for the bill, it heads to the Senate next where it is expected to pass with “broad partisan support.”
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