Marjorie Taylor Greene's Ukraine Remarks 'Very Disturbing,' Analysts Say

Georgia Republican Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene's comments about "not another penny" of aid going to Ukraine if Republicans take control of both houses of Congress are "very disturbing," a Ukrainian expert told Newsweek.

The speech by Greene, which went viral after it was shared on social media, was made at a rally in Sioux City, Iowa, on Thursday, when Greene spoke about the possibility of Republicans winning both the House and Senate in the upcoming midterm elections.

"The only border that [Democrats] care about is Ukraine, not America's southern border," Greene said.

"Under Republicans, not another penny will go to Ukraine, our country comes first. They [Democrats] don't care about our border or our people."

"Surely, such statements as far-right congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene... made about stopping financial support to Ukraine if Republicans win [the] midterns, do disturb and scare Ukrainians," Maxim Yali, Ukrainian political expert and professor of international relations at Ukraine's National Aviation University, told Newsweek.

Yali added that he felt the comments were especially worrisome since most of the Republican candidates for the House of Representatives support Donald Trump, "and, therefore, have more or less similar views" to the ones Greene has expressed.

An analysis of all Republican candidates running in the midterm elections conducted in June by The Washington Post found that more than 100 Republicans who won their party's state primary ran on a message of the 2020 presidential election being rigged or fraudulent. Eighty-two of these candidates are running for a seat in the House of Representatives.

"For the last 8 months since [the] Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine began, such trends, especially among Republicans in Congress, grew significantly," said Yali. "So if Republicans win the midterms, the process of voting for financial and military support to Ukraine both in Senate and House of Representatives will at least become much more complicated."

"Of course, we hope that such statements from far-right Republicans in Congress are mostly about the electoral race, and we shall keep the bipartisan support which we have had since 2014," Yali said. "But the trends among Republicans and [the] isolationism course in foreign affairs by Donald Trump and his supporters in Congress are really disturbing for Ukraine."

"Frankly I think that certain politicians are simply speculating on the topic," Misha Gannytskyi, director general of the Ukrainian Independent Information Agency of News (UNIAN), told Newsweek.

"It's a bad thing—because we are talking about [the] life and death of [thousands of] innocent people—but it's an issue for American voters," Gannytskyi said, adding that he hopes the U.S. support for Ukraine is bipartisan and "a matter of values" for all Americans.

"I think she's absolutely free to communicate with her electorate however she wants, I respect that. And I guess that what she implies is that she wants that money to be transferred to her local constituents. Nevertheless, in my opinion, it's a bit of a short-sighted claim, because if she wants to make America great again, the greatness of the U.S. has always been connected with its active role abroad," Dmytro Natalukha, a member of the Ukrainian parliament, told Newsweek.

"Ukraine now has become more than a country, it's a symbol of fighting against Putin, and tyranny, resisting dictatorships and fighting for freedom. I wouldn't want to think that [Greene] is ready to publicly make that same statement—if you replace the word Ukraine—saying that 'under Republicans' not another penny will go to fighting [Russian President Vladimir] Putin, to resisting dictatorships, to stand up for freedom and upholding democracy."

Greene's speech was widely criticized on social media, with Wyoming Republican Representative Liz Cheney tweeting that the Georgia congresswoman was playing into what Putin wants.

"If we'd had Republicans like this in the 1980s, we would have lost the Cold War," Cheney wrote.

Greene responded to Cheney, tweeting: "There are two things that are in the past. 1. You and your Daddy's Republican Party that sent our military to fight foreign wars on the backs of American tax dollars and didn't win a damn thing. 2. You."