Senate Republicans highlight kidnapped Ukrainian children as they push Trump on Russian sanctions

Washington – In August, when President Donald Trump deployed the red carpet for Vladimir Putin in Alaska, he provided a letter on behalf of the First Lady Melania Trump appealing to the Russian president to end his war against Ukraine and protect the children captured in the crossed aspects.

Now, the Senate Republicans are taking on a similar tactic with Trump, highlighting the nearly 20,000 Ukrainian children who have been removed since the start of the Russia’s large -scale invasion, while they are growing at aggressive sanctions targeting Russia’s oil and gas economy.

Republicans who have spent almost six months to put pressure on new sanctions against Russia think that these direct calls focus on the fate of children will help to assert the president that more difficult sanctions are necessary and finally convince his supporters that the United States must continue to provide support for Ukraine.

“It is a new front against the Putin war machine which has the best hope of galvanizing the country, whether you are republican, democrat or independent,” said Senator Lindsey Graham, Rs.c. “Taking children from their family and re -educating them is not American.”

Pressing for sanctions, Graham said: “We are talking a lot about oil, gas and land. We have to talk more about children. “

Trump’s comments this week in favor of the victory territory in Ukraine, he lost against Russia, was a “game changer,” said Graham.

The South Carolina Senator and Close Trump Ally unveiled a bill with a bipartite group earlier this year which would designate Russia as a state sponsor for its removal of Ukrainian children. Wednesday, Graham told NBC News that even if he had not approached the problem with Trump personally, he thinks that the president will support him: “I cannot imagine that he will oppose it because the people who kidnap children are terrorists.”

Graham hopes that the Senate will adopt the bill in early October, he said.

The kidnapped children were an absolute priority for the Ukrainian First Lady Olena Zelenska, who met Melania Trump on Tuesday on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York.

Melania Trump and Zelenska discussed the fate of the children affected by the war in Ukraine, after the first American lady launched a work focused on work with spouses of heads of state on the well-being of young people around the world, said Ukrainian President Volodyr Zelenskyy.

Melania Trump was “happy” to meet Zelenska, according to a spokesperson for the First Lady, and appreciates that “they have a shared vision – to advance the development of children”.

Zelenska posted a photo of the two on Facebook, adding that she was “sincerely grateful to Melania Trump” for the meeting and “impatiently waits to continue cooperation to protect what is most precious in this world – our children”.

After Melania Trump wrote her letter to Putin last month, Zelenska wrote her own thank you note to the First Lady and asked her husband to deliver him to Trump in the Oval Office during his visit to Washington.

It is not the first time that the legislators raised the issue of Russia’s actions against children in Ukraine, where the International Criminal Court, among other organizations, accused the Kremlin of removing it from children to erase their Ukrainian identities.

Sense. Amy Klobuchar, d-minn., Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., And Graham all prompted legislation that would provide resources to investigate and follow the children kidnapped and bind their return to Ukraine to put an end to war.

Senator Katie Britt, R-Ala, joined Klobuchar, Blumenthal and Graham at a press conference on the issue this month “as a mom, I can’t even imagine what your child tear,” Britt said at the press conference.

“We must all use all the tools in our toolbox to bring these babies, to bring these children back to home. It is clear that Putin will never do the right thing without being forced, and now is time to make it happen,” said Britt.

During the press conference, Graham credited Melania Trump for defending the kidnapped children. In her letter to Putin in August, the first lady said to Putin: “By protecting the innocence of these children, you will more than serve Russia alone – you serve humanity itself.”

“Such a daring idea transcends all human division, and you, Mr. Putin, are able to implement this vision with a pen today. It is time,” she wrote.