Standing up to Russia

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Joe Biden has failed one of the most important tasks of the U.S. President since 1945: preventing Russia from invading further into Europe. Biden’s policy of weakness and appeasement is radically dangerous – it already lost us Afghanistan to the Taliban, and now it is causing us to lose Ukraine to Vladimir Putin.   

• It’s important for the safety, security, and prosperity that we help Ukraine defend itself against Russia.   
• Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is already causing energy prices to spike enormously, costing Americans more at the pump and to heat their homes.  
• An invasion would disrupt global trade and Europe’s economy, causing many Americans to lose their jobs and U.S. companies to lose work.   
• Russia taking over Ukraine would bring it even closer to attacking our NATO allies who we have a legal treaty obligation to defend – which would cost even more American lives.   
• We should stand with our democratic friends and against our enemies.  

Despite Biden’s campaign pledges, his administration repeatedly blocked and delayed military aid to Ukraine.  

• As a candidate in August 2020, Joe Biden promised to actually help Ukraine, writing that: “A Biden-Harris administration will ensure that Ukraine gets the economic and military support that it needs, including lethal weapons…”   
• But in March 2021, the Biden Administration held $150M in military assistance to Ukraine, allegedly seeking Ukrainian military reforms.  
• June 2021: Biden’s National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan admits that they are holding military assistance to Ukraine “until there is a Russian military incursion”. 
• December 10, 2021: NBC reports that the Biden Administration was withholding $200 million in further military aid to Ukraine for weeks, despite urgent pleas from the Ukrainian government. 

Biden has shown enormous weakness to Russia from the moment he took office, caving time and time again. No wonder Vladimir Putin isn’t afraid of the United States anymore.

• The Trump administration stood firm against extending the New Start treaty, which gave Russia and China an unfair advantage over our nuclear forces. Republicans demanded a fair deal that would keep Russian and Chinese nuclear forces more constrained.  
• But after just 13 days - on February 3, 2021, Joe Biden extended the New START nuclear treaty with Russia without making them change one word.   
• In May 2021, President Biden ignored the law passed by Congress and failed to stop Nord Stream 2, which gave Russia an energy backdoor into Europe. 
• In July 2021, President Biden gave a green light to the Russians to continue building the NordStream pipeline, even though he killed permits for the U.S.-Canadian Keystone Pipeline.
• When Senate Republicans tried to stop the pipeline in January 2022, Senate Democrats used the filibuster to block the sanctions.  

Joe Biden doesn’t understand how to deter Vladimir Putin because he doesn’t understand strength.   

• Joe Biden and his advisors think that speeches and tweets would deter Putin – not sending military equipment and sanctioning Russia. That doesn’t scare Putin one bit.   
• The Biden Administration says they would use the threat of sanctions after an invasion to deter Russia – that’s not how deterrence works. Once Putin has invaded Ukraine it will be far too late.  
• It’s no surprise Putin isn’t scared by Joe Biden – he already showed he isn’t willing to fight for Americans when he abandoned thousands of them behind enemy lines in Afghanistan. Biden’s weakness against Iran, against China, and against the Taliban have hurt our credibility immensely. 

Republicans sent Ukraine proper military equipment and stood against Russia:   

• Democrats complained that Trump was owned by Putin. Then why didn't Putin invade three years ago? Why is this happening now under Biden? Because the media had it wrong – Trump was strong on Russia, Biden has been weak.   
• The Trump Administration sent $1.4 billion to Ukraine in security assistance.   
• 2017: $262 million. 2018: $299 million. 2019: $428 million. 2020: $412 million 
• In March 2018, President Trump approved selling 210 Javelin anti-tank missiles and 37 launchers to the Ukrainian military.  
• In June 2020, the Department of Defense approved $250 million in further funding to help Ukraine’s military deter Russian aggression.  
• From 2017-2020, the Trump Administration issued over 30 rounds of sanctions, criminal indictments, and other actions against Russia.  
• In 2018, the Trump Administration kicked out 60 Russian diplomats and spies and shuttered their consulate in Seattle.  
• Over Democrat opposition, President Trump withdrew from the one-sided INF treaty, which Russia serially violated for years, and allowed the U.S. to develop weapons to deter Russian aggression.  

 What to Do: Sanction Russia Strongly and Immediately:

• If the United States and Europe had sanctioned Russia for massing troops on Ukraine’s border, they would have realized the cost of invading Ukraine. Instead, the Biden Administration has acted like a policeman casually watching a murder unfold so he can arrest the perpetrator after the crime has been committed – instead of stopping the crime from happening in the first place. 
• For the past year, Republicans have been trying to get the Biden Administration to sanction Nord Stream 2. Biden resisted. Republicans tried to get Biden to expedite military assistance to Ukraine. Biden resisted.  

We should make Putin pay for threatening to invade Ukraine by immediately:  

• Sanctioning the Russian oligarchs with billions in net worth who support Putin.   Sanctioning Russian natural resource industries (copper, nickel, timber, machine parts, plastics, oil, chemicals), and top companies like Yandex, United Heavy Machinery, Polyus, and Rosatom.   
• Sanctioning all Russian banks, including the Russian Central Bank and removing them from the SWIFT international financial system.   
• Blocking Russia from receiving any Western technology, semiconductors, microprocessors, etc. through strict export controls.