Harris criticizes plans for Ukraine to surrender territory to Russia at Zelenskyy meeting
Vice President Kamala Harris said calls for Ukraine to relinquish territory to Russia were "dangerous and unacceptable" as she met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Thursday.
The comments from Harris were slight criticism of suggestions from Republican candidate Donald Trump and his running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, that Ukraine should quickly cut a deal to end the war, the Associated Press reported.
"They are not proposals for peace," Harris said. "Instead they are proposals for surrender."
Harris also rejected calls for the U.S. to walk away from its international role and warned that potential aggressors could be emboldened if Russian President Vladimir Putin wins, the AP noted.
"The United States supports Ukraine not out of charity, but because it’s in our strategic interest," Harris said.
Trump responded to Harris in a statement saying that "I’m the only one who can get the war stopped." The former president tells the AP that he will meet with Zelenskyy in New York on Friday after days of questions over whether the two leaders will sit down with each other.
FILE-Vice President Kamala Harris (L) shakes hands with Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky during a meeting on the sideline of the Summit on peace in Ukraine, at the luxury Burgenstock resort, near Lucerne, on June 15, 2024. (Photo by ALESSANDRO
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Harris' meeting with Zelenskyy came after the Ukrainian leader sat down with President Joe Biden, who announced billions of dollars more in missiles, drones, ammunition and other supplies.
The AP reports the weapons include an additional Patriot missile defense battery and a new shipment of glide bombs that can be deployed from Western fighter jets, increasing their strike range.
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Biden is planning to convene a meeting with other world leaders focused on Ukraine’s defense during a visit to Germany next month, per White House.gov.
Zelenskyy found some bipartisan support as he visited Capitol Hill on Thursday, where he was greeted by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.
Sen. Lindsay Graham, a South Carolina Republican, said Zelenskyy asked to use long-range weapons, such as British-supplied Storm Shadow missiles or U.S.-made ATACMS, for "maximum benefit to bring (Russian President Vladimir) Putin to the table" and increase Ukraine's negotiating position.
Meanwhile, the Ukrainian leader’s rocky relationship with former President Donald Trump continued to regress this week. Instead of meeting with Zelenskyy, Trump has criticized him. As for U.S. support for Ukraine, Trump complained that "we continue to give billions of dollars to a man who refuses to make a deal" to end the war, the AP reported.
The New Yorker published an interview with Zelenskyy in which he criticized JD Vance, Trump's running mate, as "too radical" for suggesting that Ukraine needs to give up some territory to end the war.
Zelenskyy also minimized Trump's claims that he could quickly negotiate a solution, saying "my feeling is that Trump doesn’t really know how to stop the war, even if he might think he knows how," the AP noted, citing the New Yorker article.
Trump was impeached during his first term in office over asking Zelenskyy for assistance probing Biden, then a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination, at a time when the Ukrainian leader was requesting support from Washington, according to the Associated Press.
Zelenskyy's trip to Washington, D.C. coincides with the annual meeting of the U.N. General Assembly in New York, where he spoke on Wednesday.
Separately, roughly two thirds of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents said the U.S. has a responsibility to help Ukraine, compared with one third of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents, according to a Pew Research Center poll conducted in July.
And Americans are also split on which presidential candidate would do a better job handling the war. An AP-NORC poll from August found that about one-third of Americans said they trusted Harris more, while a similar share said the same about Trump.