Backing Kyiv not key for the US, says Ron DeSantis

The Florida governor, considered all but certain to join the 2024 presidential race, has aligned with Donald Trump.

The remarks by Ron DeSantis contrast with his more hawkish record on Ukraine while in congress. Picture: AFP

Protecting Ukraine is not “vital” for the US, likely presidential candidate Ron DeSantis said, underscoring that the top two Republican contenders don’t see Russia’s invasion of Kyiv as a ­foreign policy priority.

Mr DeSantis, the 44-year-old Florida governor, said the US “has many vital national interests” but “becoming further entangled in a territorial dispute between Ukraine and Russia is not one of them.”

The remark aligns Mr De­Santis, considered all but certain to join the 2024 race, with former president Donald Trump in opposing the establishment Republican policy of backing Kyiv.

Mr DeSantis was responding in writing this week to Fox News, which asked major Republican presidential candidates for their views on what is certain to be one of the most pressing foreign policy issues in next year’s election.

He was asked whether opposing Russia in Ukraine was a vital American national strategic interest. His answer demonstrates the sharp fissure within a party that has traditionally pushed for powerful US engagement on the global stage, as establishment Republicans are challenged by a growing isolationist contingent.

“The Biden administration’s virtual ‘blank cheque’ funding of this conflict for ‘as long as it takes’, without any defined objectives or accountability, distracts from our country’s most pressing challenges,” he said.

Mr Trump, responding to the same question on whether US backing for Kyiv was vital for Washington, said: “No, but it is for Europe. But not for the ­United States”.

He said he was the only politician who could prevent a third world war erupting out of the Russian invasion.

Mr Trump, 76, said he would end the conflict in less than 24 hours, without giving details.

Establishment Republicans have long argued that defending Ukraine and halting further Russian expansionism was crucial to US interests and not just European security.

The position Mr DeSantis has staked out contrasts with his more hawkish record on Ukraine while he was in congress, when he supported military aid for Kyiv after Moscow’s annexing of the Crimean peninsula in 2014. He also backed a resolution pressuring then president Barack Obama to provide weapons to help Kyiv.

A poll by the Pew Research Centre in January found that 40 per cent of Republicans and ­Republican-leaning independent voters believed the US was giving too much support to Ukraine.

AFP