Michigan Republican U.S. Rep. Peter Meijer said it's past time for the United States to send a high-ranking senior official to Ukraine to show solidarity with the war-torn nation.
“We seem to be wringing our hands and fretting about having a senior official step foot on Ukrainian soil. It makes the U.S. look scared, it makes us look weak, it makes us look hesitant,” Meijer said in a Tuesday interview.
“I just think it's an important thing to affirm — that we're not afraid to be there. That we're not letting Vladimir Putin tell us where we can and cannot go.”
Meijer’s remarks came as pressure has increased on the Biden administration to send an envoy to Ukraine after recent visits there by British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, the leaders of several Eastern European nations and others.
But the White House reiterated late Monday that President Joe Biden has no plans to travel to Ukraine.
“That has not changed,” White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki told reporters Monday.
“What our focus continues to be on is providing Ukraine, the Ukrainian government, and Ukrainian leaders a historic amount of security assistance — assistance that's been adapted based on their needs and their successes on the ground.”
Psaki added that, if anyone from the administration were to go to Ukraine, she would not outline those plans publicly for security reasons. “So we wouldn't have any details to preview regardless,” she said.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy suggested Sunday on CNN that he wants Biden to visit Ukraine and said, “I think he will."
“It’s his decision, of course,” Zelenskyy said. “And about the safety situation: It depends. But I think he’s the leader of the United States, and that’s why he should come here, to see.”
Biden traveled to Poland in March, meeting U.S. troops and Ukrainian refugees displaced by Russia’s invasion and accused Vladimir Putin of committing war crimes.
Meijer, a freshman congressman and Iraq veteran, was not necessarily calling on Biden himself to go to Ukraine, but said the secretary of state or secretary of defense or other senior officials or lawmakers should go and “stand shoulder to shoulder” with Ukrainian leaders on the ground.
Meijer said his view comes from conversations he’s had with Ukrainian government officials who express gratitude for the weaponry and support but point out the U.S. is the only “substantial” partner to Ukraine that’s not sent an envoy.
"We still don't have a diplomatic presence in country, and this is something that members of Ukrainian Parliament have raised and said, honestly, it's a little bit insulting," Meijer said.
He said the matter is personal to him, recalling that during two years in Afghanistan as an adviser to humanitarian groups he never encountered a member of the U.S. State Department, with the exception of one or two liaisons at U.S. bases.
"It's important that we not shrink from the world, and part of not shrinking from the world is showing up, right?" Meijer said. "If the prime minister of England can go and walk around the streets of Kyiv, what excuse do we have?"
Meijer made a splash last year when he secretly flew to Kabul with Democratic Rep. Seth Moulton of Massachusetts and spent 12 hours on the ground there amid the chaotic evacuation after the Taliban took over Afghanistan.
Meijer has been a vocal proponent of the U.S. sending more military aid to Ukraine, helping lead a bipartisan letter to Biden earlier this month to provide more weapons, including long-range surface-to-air missiles, fighter aircraft and drones.
Biden authorized an additional $800 million in military assistance for Ukraine last week ahead of the new offensive in the Donbas region, including artillery systems, artillery rounds, armored personnel carriers and helicopters, he said in a statement.
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