American Republicans who like Putin

"Enemy or ally?

Large parts of the Republican Party now treat Vladimir Putin as if he were an ideological ally.

This combination is clearly unusual and sometimes confusing. It does not appear to stem from any compromising information that Putin has about Donald Trump, despite years of such claims from Democrats. 

Instead, Trump and many other Republicans seem to feel ideological sympathies with Putin’s version of right-wing nationalism. 

They see the world dividing between a liberal left and an illiberal right, with both themselves and Putin — along with Viktor Orban of Hungary and some other world leaders — in the second category.

Whatever the explanation, the situation threatens decades of bipartisan consensus about U.S. national security.

Already, House Republicans have blocked further aid to Ukraine — a democracy and U.S. ally. Without the aid, military experts say Russia will probably be able to take over more of Ukraine than it now holds.

If Trump wins a second term, he may go further. He has suggested that he might abandon the U.S. commitment to NATO, an alliance that exists to contain Russia and that Putin loathes. He recently invited Russia to “to do whatever the hell they want” to NATO countries that don’t spend enough on their own defense. (Near the end of his first term, he tried to pull American troops out of Germany, but President Biden rescinded the decision.)

Trump has repeatedly praised Putin as a strong and smart leader. In a town hall last year, Trump refused to say whether he wanted Ukraine or Russia to win the conflict.

There are some caveats worth mentioning. Some skepticism about how much money the U.S. should send to Ukraine stems from practical questions about the conflict’s endgame. It’s also true that some prominent Republicans, especially in the Senate, are horrified by their party’s pro-Russian drift and are lobbying the House to pass Ukraine aid. “If your position is being cheered by Vladimir Putin, it’s time to reconsider your position,” Senator Mitt Romney of Utah said last month.

But the Republican fascination with Putin and Russia is real. The Putin-friendly faction of the party is ascendant, while some of his biggest critics, like Mitch McConnell, who announced this week that he would step down this year as the Republican Senate leader, will soon retire.

(We recommend this article — in which Carl Hulse, The Times’s chief Washington correspondent, explains that while McConnell sees the U.S. as the world’s essential force, a growing number of Republicans do not.)

In the rest of today’s newsletter, we’ll walk through the evidence of this shift.

Ukraine aid

The Senate has passed an additional $60 billion in aid to Ukraine, with both Republican and Democratic support. But the House, which Republicans control, has so far refused to pass that bill. House Speaker Mike Johnson, who is close to Trump, has not allowed a vote on the bill even though it would likely pass if he did.

A few Republicans have gone so far as speak about Ukraine and its president, Volodymyr Zelensky, in ways that mimic the Russians. Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene has accused Ukraine of having “a Nazi army,” echoing language Putin used.

Military experts say that if Ukraine does not receive more U.S. aid, it could begin losing the conflict in the second half of this year. “Not since the first chaotic months of the conflict, when Russian troops poured across the borders from every direction, has Ukraine faced such a precarious moment,” wrote our colleagues Andrew Kramer and Marc Santora, who have been reporting from Ukraine.

Alexander Smirnov

House Republicans hoping to impeach President Biden have repeatedly promoted ideas that appears to have been based partly on Russian information. One example: The Republicans cited an F.B.I. document in which an informant accused Biden and his son, Hunter, of taking $5 million bribes from the owner of Burisma, a Ukrainian gas company.

But federal prosecutors have now accused the informant, Alexander Smirnov, of fabricating the allegation to damage Biden’s 2020 presidential campaign. Smirnov has told the F.B.I. that people linked to Russian intelligence passed him information about Hunter Biden.

A federal judge has ordered Smirnov detained and called him a flight risk.

Tucker Carlson

Tucker Carlson is not a Republican Party official, but he is an influential Trump supporter, and Carlson has often echoed the Russians. At least once, he went so far as to say he hoped Russia would win its conflict with Ukraine.

Last month, Carlson aired a two-hour interview with Putin in which Putin made claims about Ukraine, Zelensky and Western leaders with little pushback from Carlson. In a separate video recorded inside a Russian grocery store, Carlson suggested life in Russia was better than in the U.S.

Republican voters

The shift in elite Republican opinion toward Russia and away from Ukraine has influenced public opinion.

Shortly after events in Ukraine started, about three-quarters of Republicans favored giving Ukraine military and economic aid, according to the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. Now, only about half do.

Republican voters are also less likely to hold favorable views of Zelensky. In one poll, most Trump-aligned Republicans even partly blamed him for the conflict. Republicans also support NATO at lower rates than Democrats and independents, a shift from the 1980s.

More on the conflict

• “Donald Trump views himself as a Putinesque figure,” Hakeem Jeffries, the Democratic House leader, has said. “We should believe him that he wants to go down this road.” Jeffries also told The Times how he hoped Ukraine aid could pass.
• The Biden administration is considering giving Ukraine weapons from Pentagon stockpiles even though it lacks money to replace them, a short-term bid to aid Ukraine until Congress acts.
• Putin warned that direct Western intervention in Ukraine would risk nuclear war, alluding in a speech to the French president’s recent comments about sending NATO troops there.
• Trump plans to meet next week with Viktor Orban, Hungary’s right-wing prime minister." [1]

1.  Republicans who like Putin. Leonhardt, David; Ian Prasad Philbrick.  New York Times (Online)New York Times Company. Mar 1, 2024.