With Ukraine War, Republicans find religion on democracy

Rep. Scott Perry (R., Pa.), who once advised President Donald Trump’s White House on undermining the 2020 election results, and who was a target of the U.S. House committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, has now found a democracy worth defending.

It’s in Kyiv.

Taking to Twitter on Sunday, Perry denounced Russian strongman Vladimir Putin as a “murderous thug” who’s “targeting civilians [and] committing war crimes” as his forces try to shatter the eastern European nation.

“Congress must stand united to demand [Putin] and his thug regime are brought to justice,” thundered Perry, a veteran, who played a “key role” in Trump’s abortive plot two years ago to oust his acting attorney general and replace him with one more sympathetic to Trump’s fact-free and debunked claims that the 2020 election had been stolen from him.

Perry isn’t alone, of course.

Other Republicans, apparently immune to the epic cognitive dissonance it takes to simultaneously condemn Russia and stand in solidarity with Ukraine, even as they retain membership in a political party that dismisses the sacking of the Capitol as an exercise in “legitimate political discourse,” also are bravely and unironically stepping into the breach.

Take House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy.

During a recent appearance on Fox & Friends, the chamber’s top Republican criticized President Joe Biden for dragging his feet on providing military assistance to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s government.

“The challenge that we have is, it’s the actions that we could have done before from this administration to make sure today wasn’t happening,” McCarthy told the network. “We could have supplied the weapons to Ukraine. They’re not asking for American troops, they’re just asking for the ability to fight.”

McCarthy also noted that Ukraine has been “outgunned” by Russia and said that “we could have deterred this from ever happening."

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