The Daily Signal - Sen. Marshall: Why He Voted NO on $60 Billion for Ukraine

Episode Date: May 1, 2024

Sen. Roger Marshall was one of only 15 Republican senators who voted against sending an additional $60 billion to Ukraine for its war against Russia.  “One of my jobs is to prioritize where we're spending the money,” Marshall says. “And I'm telling you, until we secure the border, I don't think we should be spending any money outside of this country, let alone on what I'm describing as really Ukraine's … never-ending war.” The Senate passed the foreign aid package, which totaled $95 billion and included aid for Israel and Taiwan, on April 23.  Marshall says that six times he “brought to the Senate floor stand-alone funding for Israel—the opportunity to fund just Israel, to take these issues one at a time. Six times the Democrats blocked that opportunity.”  “The Democrats used Israel as leverage to get their votes for Ukraine,” the Kansas senator said.  Marshall joins “The Daily Signal Podcast” to discuss what America’s relationship with Ukraine should look like over the course of the next year. The senator also addresses the ongoing pro-Palestinian protests on America’s university campuses and what similarities can be drawn between these protests and the anti-war protests at colleges in the 1960s and 1970s.  Enjoy the show! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the Daily Signal podcast for Wednesday. May 1st, I'm Virginia Allen. While the Senate, about a week ago, they passed an additional $60 billion for Ukraine within a larger $95 billion foreign aid package. There were only 15 GOP senators that voted against that package, and Senator Roger Marshall was one of them. He joins us on today's show to explain why and what America should be focused on instead of sending additional funds to Ukraine right now. We also discuss the ongoing pro-Palestinian protests on America's college campuses and where those are headed. Stay tuned for our conversation after this.

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Now back in studio, thank you so much for being with us, Senator Marshall. Virginia, it's great to be here. And before we get started, I shared with you, I just got to drive over from my office and clear my mind a little bit. And I was sitting there thinking, how would I explain what heritage is and daily signal is to my family and my friends and people? And I thought about my military experience. And I would call this, that you're a force multiplier. So people get news at different places right now, but I appreciate you helping us get our message out. and amplifying the message.

And we're fortunate that we agree on the same basic set of values. But really, when 95% of the media is extinguishing everything I say, I just want to say thank you for a daily signal and heritage for what you do up here and helping amplify our voice being that force multiplier. Well, thank you, Senator. It's a pleasure to have individuals like yourself who are advocating for really critical policy issues on Capitol Hill. And we appreciate you taking the time and being willing to talk about those.

And one of those very, very important issues is that of foreign aid. And just recently last week we saw that the Senate passed a foreign aid bill that includes $60 billion in additional aid for Ukraine. There were 15 Republican senators that did not vote for this package. You were one of those. There were three GOP senators that didn't vote at all. And 31 who voted yes. Why were you one of the 15 that voted against sending an additional $60 billion to Ukraine?

Virginia, we have to take our own border first, that that is very clearly the priority, the most significant threat to us, immediate threat to our country right now is our southern border. And if I can back up, you know, this is an opportunity for people who get to know me. I wake up at the morning. I have quiet time. I read my scripture every morning. I pray. And one of my prayers is from the book of Mike is that I would do.

justice, that I would love mercy and walk humbly. And I think the due justice part right now is very clearly I need to prioritize and reprioritize every day what's important. There's so much noise up here. Every day, 20, 40 people are going to come to me and say, look, the federal government gave us X dollars last year. We got inflation. We got a bigger opportunity.

We need two X. Everybody. And here we are spending a trillion dollars on interest this year. one of my jobs is to prioritize where we're spending the money. And I'm telling you, until we secure the border, I don't think we should be spending any money outside of this country, let alone on what I'm describing as really Ukraine's become a never-ending war. What about the issue of Israel, though? Because I think that that is one of the reasons why we saw some GOP members really stand for this. The whole spending package was $95 billion in foreign aid, so that the biggest chunk, of course, was for your reason.

Ukraine, that's 60 billion. Then there was also money for Taiwan and Israel. And some GOP members were saying, well, I have to back it because Israel and Israel needs our aid or needs our support. Yeah. So six times I brought to the Senate floor standalone funding for Israel, the opportunity to fund just Israel to take these issues one at a time. And six time the Democrats blocked that opportunity. So the Democrats, we fell into their hands. The Democrats used Israel as leverage to get their votes for Ukraine. And I'm just not going to play that game. I'll always stand beside Israel. There's not a stronger supporter of Israel to appear than I am. And, you know, this is a spiritual issue for me going, you know, back this is what I was taught in Sunday school by my pastors,

my parents, is to support Israel. And they've been a great ally and a great friend. But I just don't think that I'm going to take all this bad to take that one little piece of good. Now, when we look forward as to what's happening next, it's been interesting to see, and I know you've weighed in on this on X, but on Monday, Ukraine and U.S. officials, they had the third round of negotiations on a future bilateral security agreement. What do we know about what would be included with this agreement between Israel and the United States? Well, Virginia, this is why I'm calling it. It's officially a never-ending war now. They're talking five years or talking about 10-year agreement. And where they end up, I don't know. But maybe to the tune of $80 billion per year.

I just want to remind your listeners, look, I feel for the people of Ukraine. Our border is my priority. I wake up again, think about the health, safety, and security of Americans. We've already spent, I suppose, $180 billion there. And the border, the front where the fight is happening has not moved in a year and a half. This is turning into Afghanistan. It's turning into Iraq where this is going to go on for years and years and years. We're not going to be able to push Russia out of Crimea, which is that's what the Ukraine's goals are.

So here we're entering to a long-term commitment. They're worried what if President Trump gets in there, and he's going to stop this nonsense, right? He's going to be focused on a peace agreement. So very concerned about committing us to another five or ten years of funding. for a war that I don't think that Ukraine ever wins. Okay, well, then how can lawmakers in D.C. navigate this? Because it doesn't seem like a win for the United States if ultimately Putin gains control of Ukraine. Yeah. So certainly I want to condemn Mr. Putin everything he's done here.

I think we have to, you'll go back to this piece through strength strategy. Our bigger priority right now should be what's happening in China. discussed that some other day, but I'm much more convinced the long-term threat from this world comes from China. And the EU, the European Union, should be taken on Russia. We're willing to help them, but we shouldn't be the driver of this. And I know some people are out there saying, well, Europe's giving as much as the United States as, I'm going to say maybe, I don't believe it. Maybe they've made some commitments to do that as well. But I really think that Europe has to take the driver's seat in this conflict with Russia. Russia's economy is the size of Italy.

So the EU's economy is multiples, 10, 15 times bigger than Russia's. So they need to make an investment to protect themselves. Yes, we'll be there to help. We have 100,000 troops in Europe right now. I don't know how many tanks and jets that we have there. But we have a huge commitment there already that we shouldn't have to be feeding that an extra $100 billion per year. I think that Europe can handle Russia.

I think that we need to make sure our NATO countries are strong. We are. The first infantry division from Kansas has been over the first. there for at least 10 years, training people in Poland, the Baltics, how to fight with their big tanks and use American ingenuity in innovations as well. So we've got a huge presence there already. We should be able to hold Russia in check, but Europe needs to take more of the lead on that. So if you were advising the president on what America's relationship with Ukraine should look like in the next year, what would you say? That's a great question, Virginia. You know,

first of all, I'm sad we're here. We didn't have to be. here. But we are here. Look, I think he needs to make some better priority choices. If we would secure our own border, I'd feel much better about giving Ukraine money. But I also feel bad that we're having to borrow money from China to give Ukraine those dollars.

I think if I was him, I would be focusing on NATO, on NATO countries, on European countries to do their job and make them lead that relationship rather than us having to be the driver of that relationship. We need more accountability over there as well. I'm sorry to say this, but I think it's still a corrupt

nation. I think it's a corrupt government in Ukraine. They still have not had adequate accounting of what we've sent over there. So I think there's some things that we could do from an accounting standpoint, too. Yeah, excellent. Senator, while we have you here, I want to take a few minutes to talk about a pretty major domestic issue that has just arisen really over the past week, if not maybe 10 days. And that is what's happening on our college campuses. We have seen pro-Palestinian protests encampments pop up on university campuses literally all over the United States. And I have attended the protests at George Washington University here in D.C. Just a scene talked with some of the protesters, why they were there. And I'm fascinated that the atmosphere and the tone of these protests feels

a lot like the Black Lives Matter protests in the summer of 2022, a lot like the pro-abortion protests in the summer of, oh, excuse me, Black Lives Letter in the summer of 2020 and then the pro-abortion protests in the summer of 2022. Why do you think that we're seeing these protests and these movements pop up now almost every single summer? Yeah, Virginia, obviously there's a group of very evil people that are funding and organizing these. And I'll even go back through to President Trump's inauguration when we tried to walk through

town here celebrating his victory. And there was all these people that didn't look like they belonged here, that they're not from here, that were protesting. And there were certainly, I saw these very people were very purposeful that were organized protesters. They were like the cheerleaders as well. So they've got this, whoever they are, and whether it's George Soros and some of these other, quote, non-profits that are funding these, they have their printing machines ready to go. All those things are happening.

I think it's very organized. I think this is part of the battle of the soul this stuff. nation right now, that these folks are criminals that are rioting right now. They don't have their legal right to dispout the hate that they're spouting, to keep school from happening, to keep graduations from happening. But it really goes back to at least December, if not before. You know, there was little inklings of this. We gave them an inch and they took a mile. When they saw that they could push these college presidents around, and we saw the testimony on Capitol Hill that these people were weak need, the university presidents were weak need, and they were going to bow to these anti-Semitic groups.

And what's frustrating to me, if these rioters were saying anything else or had different signs that said anything that, except anti-Semitic phrases or anti-Zionism, if you substitute any other religious groups, color of skin, ethnicity, the FBI would be there saying, oh, this is hate crime. I'm just baffled. I don't understand why this is not a hate crime. I don't understand why university presidents aren't stepping up. We need to defund them. Why isn't the FBI stepping up? Why isn't the National Guard? I think back to what President Reagan did when he was governor,

what President Eisenhower did when he was president in similar scenarios, and they responded very forcefully and very early. And now the horse is out of the barn. I've been thinking a little bit about just the history of protests in America. recently just with these new pro-Palestinian protests and thinking about the anti-Vietnam war protests that we saw in the 1960s, the 1970s. Do you think that there's any similarity between those protests and what we're seeing today? Or are these two totally different things driven by a different set of values and ideology?

You know, we need to write that some type of a history account because I was thinking the same thing. So I was a young child, young, young, during the Vietnam riots. And there are similarities. And there were peaceful protests. And trust me, there were very violent protest as well. I think I hear some of the people talking to the media and saying, oh, those were all peaceful protests in the country. And they were not, obviously, as well. So I think that the similarities you have young people that are wanting to fight for a cause.

You know, we all felt that way. And I'm a little bit more mature now. You're still very young. But I think that you're trying to put your mark on life. You feel like you're ignored. When you're a young adult, you feel like you're ignored by the government. So like Vietnam, there was a large group of people that were disgusted with the war efforts there today, a large group of people, mostly young, but the professional aspects is what different. I think that those riots in the 1960s were very spontaneous.

They didn't have professionally made signs. That's the big difference now. I think there was a big funding mechanism. They didn't all have the same tents that they were sleeping under, the same type of water bottles and the same exact type of signs. Yeah, that's a really interesting answer. The organizational structure is different of what we're seeing now. What do you think the response should be from colleges, from leadership at colleges? Very forceful.

I think if you're not a college student, you're trespassing and they need to be arrested. I mean like arrested and thrown in jail, not let out in 30 seconds like they do with the protesters here that entered the Senate office building a couple weeks. They arrested and they took them to jail. They booked them and let them go. But those folks are trespassing. If there's people here that are protesting that are illegal aliens, they need to be deported. I think the students in most of these campuses have been given adequate warning to cease and desist. If we can't have classes today, then the university.

president is not doing their job. So if those students are preventing classes from happening, if they are spewing hatred, then they need to be arrested as well, that they're breaking the law. And then what else can Congress do? Look, there are laws already that we should be taken away their funding for not protecting civil rights. But there's probably more things we can do. We can tighten up more of the funding that we're given them as well. Maybe we should start taxing their foundations. So I do think that we need to be more aggressive. It's just so sad to see this education system become woke.

I had no idea who these people were, but evidently they've been preaching this anti-Semitism model now for several years. We let them get away with it. We need young men and women with godly values to go back into teaching. It does make you think about the value of college now, and if it has anywhere near the kind of value that it had 20, 30, 50 years ago really makes you question that. As we head into summer, final thoughts on what we're going to be seeing from Capitol Hill. There's obviously a lot of issues facing our nation right now.

We're headed towards an election. What can we be expecting this summer? A lot of campaigning. Virginia, I don't think we're going to see much at all on Capitol Hill. We need to keep our eye on what the White House is doing as far as rules coming out. I think that they are always looking for opportunities, more and more burdensome regulation. So I think that's what we got our eye on. There is the federal aviation authorization bill that we'll be considering this week and next week as well.

And maybe a farm bill out there as well. But I just don't see a whole lot left that we're going to get finished. There'll be a lot of talk. But I think the focus is already on the – it feels like the election is tomorrow up here. Senator Marshall, thank you for your time. We greatly appreciate it. Yeah, Virginia, I enjoyed it. And with that, that's going to do it for today's episode.

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