We often are reminded that among elected Republicans, those who question or oppose additional support for Ukraine in its war effort are a minority. But among those who elect Republicans, skepticism about America’s foreign policy commands a healthy majority. Republican voters are more anti-war than their elected officials, which might explain why the few elected officials who differ from the Atlantic, the Brookings Institution, and the foreign-policy blob in D.C.— people such as Rand Paul and J. D. Vance — are willing to make so much noise about it. Seventy-one percent of Republicans oppose more funding for Ukraine. It was precisely anticipation of this arriving freight train of Republican skepticism that drove House minority leader Kevin McCarthy and Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell to give the Biden administration more money than it requested for Ukraine before the last Congress adjourned.
There is also no longer any sign that skepticism about Ukraine will be an electoral anchor for Republicans. It’s something that was obvious to anyone who could detect the forces of political gravity acting over the last 18 months. CNN’s latest polling on the war shows that a majority of Americans oppose giving Ukraine more funding. The public is also skeptical about giving weapons, not a surprise when Ukraine is using them up so quickly that the U.S. is depleting its own stockpiles. According to the poll:
Comments