During recent debate in the House, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) faced intense opposition over an amendment she’d proposed that would have stripped a planned increase of tens of millions of dollars in the funding that the U.S. provides to an initiative of NATO called the NATO Security Investment Programme.
The House eventually rejected the amendment, preserving the ambitions to increase the U.S. contribution to those coffers. But that rejection didn’t come before Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.) ripped Greene as standing to become “Putin’s enabler” if her measure was approved. Democrats and others in favor of supporting Ukraine amid their war with Russia have consistently argued that the U.S. has an interest, even if not direct, in Ukraine prevailing. The U.S. also maintains an established interest in the preservation of NATO, with the alliance understood to provide a key foundation for the Western world’s defense against military aggression and incursions from authoritarian figures like Putin.
“Putin benefits from this amendment,” Connolly told the House. “Putin, a sociopath, who is engaged in the most depraved behavior in our lifetime: killing innocent men and women, targeting hospitals, targeting schools, and showing no restraint. This Congress must stand with Ukraine. This Congress can never be seen as Putin’s enabler. That is what this amendment does. That is what is behind it. The author of this amendment has already said she wants to give zero to Ukraine, so we know the motivation behind the amendment. Let’s reject it. Let’s stand with Ukraine and make sure Putin gets that message loud and strong with a forceful voice here on the floor of the House of Representatives.”
Republican opposition to NATO, which has broadly backed Ukraine through not with direct involvement, from the ideological corner of the party represented by Greene has been consistent, with Donald Trump himself questioning the U.S. commitment to the alliance. During the House debate over Greene’s proposal, another Democrat — Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (Fla.) — responded to the frequent criticism from certain Republicans about other alliance members supposedly not spending their fair share on their national defense, arguing that the NATO funding Greene was targeting is considered entirely separately from that analysis.
