Pro-Putin lawmakers go silent

If there was ever such a thing as a pro-Kremlin Caucus in Congress, it has disbanded following Moscow’s incursion into Ukraine.

A small handful of conservative Republicans had looked to President Vladimir Putin as a kindred spirit in his forceful crackdown on Islamist militants in the restive Caucasus. Now they’ve either gone silent or done a 180 as Russian troops have poured into Crimea.

{mosads}“I believe that we could work with the Russians on some joint areas in the national security interest, including the war on terror,” said Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa), who participated in a delegation to see Federal Security Service officials in Moscow after last year’s Boston bombing. “There’s common cause that’s there, but this has reignited the Cold War.”

King took heat last year when he defended a Russian court’s prison sentence against rock band Pussy Riot after they sang a lewd song protesting Putin’s rule in a church. He told The Hill on Thursday that Putin had drawn a “modern Iron Curtain” across eastern Europe and should be confronted.

Others have gone silent.

Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.), a Putin defender who organized last year’s trip to Moscow, had previously lambasted Congress for siding with pro-western Ukrainian protesters. He used his perch as chairman of the House Foreign Affairs panel on Europe to rail against a resolution in January blaming President Viktor Yanukovych, who has since fled to Russia, for the increasing violence.

“Why do we in the U.S. feel it necessary to thwart Russian efforts in various parts of the world? Russia rightfully looks at this as a hostile act,” Rohrabacher said in his latest statement on his website, dated Feb. 25. “We instead should reach out to make Russia a friend and ally in combating radical Islam and China, which now threaten the world’s peace and stability.”

Rohrabacher was one of 23 Republicans — most of them fiscal hawks — who voted against extending a $1 billion line of credit to Ukraine on Thursday. But the usually outspoken lawmaker didn’t say a word during Thursday’s markup of a Russia sanctions resolution and ducked out before the unanimous voice vote. 

“Smart politicians know not to defend the indefensible,” a lawmaker on the committee told The Hill. “Dana is a smart politician.”

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