GOP Sens. Marco Rubio and Rand Paul on Wednesday during a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on emergency funding for Ukraine pushed back on the Biden administration's request for more aid for Kyiv.
"You can have all of this goodwill, and try to fix the world's problems, but you are ignoring the rot and ruin you are creating in your own country," Kentucky's Paul told the State Department's James O'Brien. "What is being done at the State Department to search for an offramp?"
O'Brien, the assistant secretary of the Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs, responded: "If we don't stand with Ukraine now, we will be spending much more on defense in the future. Much of the supplemental goes to reinvest in the United States, so, far from rot and ruin. We are shoring up the foundations in our energy sector."
The aid package, Paul countered, is a gift for the defense industry.
"So, your argument is that war and funding war around the world is good for our armaments industry," Paul said. "Really, it is a justification of war. To me, that is sort of reprehensible."
Rubio, of Florida, argued that the Biden White House should focus on fixing issues at the U.S. border instead, and that people were asking him why Ukraine is important when "we have 5-6000 people a day crossing our border.
"We've got all these other needs. We're running up this enormous debt. Now, obviously, we've got to help Israel," he added.
"We still have to build up our military because the real risk is China. … We can't allow borders to be changed unilaterally, and we have to stand with our allies," Rubio said. "I'm not diminishing any of those things. But those arguments are too vague, they make sense here, but I'm just telling you, they're too vague. And I think this notion that we need to do whatever it takes, or however long it takes, is also misguided."
Solange Reyner ✉
Solange Reyner is a writer and editor for Newsmax. She has more than 15 years in the journalism industry reporting and covering news, sports and politics.
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