US House Rep. Liz Cheney said Sunday morning that she thinks the missile strike on the Ukrainian train station this week “clearly is genocide,” and said that European countries need to “understand that they’re funding that genocidal campaign” through the purchase of oil and gas from Russia.
“I understand the economic consequences to countries in Western Europe if they were to impose a kind of oil and gas embargo that the US has imposed against Russian oil and gas – but they need to do it.”
Cheney, a Wyoming Republican, told CNN’s Jake Tapper on “State of the Union” that the US should increase its own production of oil to aid Europe, but added “they need to understand that every single time, every single day that they are continuing to import Russian oil and gas, they’re funding Putin’s genocide in Ukraine.”
Cheney, who serves on the House Armed Services Committee, also said she disagrees with White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan about negotiating with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“No, I wasn’t satisfied with what I heard,” she said in reference to Sullivan’s interview with Tapper earlier in the program. “I think that that it’s crucially important that United States be clear that we are absolutely committed to Zelensky’s victory. We should not be talking about, as Jake Sullivan did just now, improving Zelensky’s position at the negotiating table. This is about defeating Russian forces in Ukraine.”
She also knocked the Biden administration over the supply of weapons to Ukraine, saying “we need to be doing right now is doing much more much faster to provide them with the equipment that they need.”
She said the United States should be more involved in the sea of Azov to keep aid going to Ukraine, saying “we ought to be doing much more to help keep the shipping lanes open to ensure that the Ukrainians are not continuing to suffer from the kind of economic blockade that the Russians are attempting to impose now,” she said.
“I think the West and NATO has got to understand that Putin’s defeat in Ukraine is a fundamental national security interest for us.”
