(WASHINGTON) — Much of official Washington remembered former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, the first woman to ever serve in that role, at her funeral Wednesday at Washington National Cathedral.
Albright, who had cancer, died in March at the age of 84.
She served as secretary of state from 1997 to 2001 under President Bill Clinton after serving as the U.S. ambassador to the U.N. from 1993 to 1997.
President Joe Biden eulogized Albright, sharing a story of a speech he gave last month in Poland, where he said a crowd of hundreds cheered when Albright’s name was mentioned.
“Her name is still synonymous with America as a force for good in the world. Madeleine never minced words or wasted time when she saw something needed fixing, or someone who needed helping. She just got to work,” Biden said.
During her tenure as secretary of state, she focused on promoting the eastward expansion of NATO and pushed for NATO intervention in the 1999 war in Kosovo, according to the historical office of the Department of State.
Her approach to diplomacy and statecraft was colored by her own experiences as a refugee who fled what was then Czechoslovakia with her family in the aftermath of World War II.
She remained engaged with both American and international affairs until the end of her life, writing a book in 2018 warning about a resurgence of fascism and sounding an alarm about Russian President Vladimir Putin in a New York Times op-ed published just before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
“In early 2000, I became the first senior U.S. official to meet with Vladimir Putin in his new capacity as acting president of Russia… Flying home, I recorded my impressions. ‘Putin is small and pale,’ I wrote, ‘so cold as to be almost reptilian,'” Albright wrote in the Times. She added that “should he invade [Ukraine], it will be a historic error.”
Both former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton were also slated to speak at the funeral, according to the Washington National Cathedral.
“Few leaders have been so perfectly suited for the times in which they served… Because she knew firsthand that America’s policy decisions had the power to make a difference in people’s lives around the world, she saw her jobs as both an obligation and an opportunity,” the former president wrote in a statement the day Albright died.
Her daughters, Anne, Alice and Katie, were also scheduled to speak.
ABC News’ Emily Shapiro contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas faced blunt questions from lawmakers on Wednesday about how the Biden administration is handling and preparing for the eventual end of pandemic-justified border restrictions that have reduced humanitarian relief options for asylum seekers at the border.
On Monday, a federal judge in Louisiana indicated he would pause the rollback of Title 42 — the Trump-era policy that allowed migrants seeking asylum along the southern border to be expelled under the public health emergency authority of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — in order to mitigate the spread of COVID-19.
The Democratic Chair of the House Appropriations Committee, Rep. Lucille Roybal-Allard, asked Mayorkas directly if he believes it’s time to end Title 42 and, as he has done before, Mayorkas deferred to the CDC.
“Our responsibility in the Department of Homeland Security is to implement the Title 42 authority of the CDC at our border and to implement it effectively and judiciously according to the law. We are mindful that the that there can be an increase in migratory flows encountered at our southern border should Title 42 come to an end, as the CDC has determined it needs to do by May 23. Our responsibility therefore, is to prepare and plan for that eventuality.”
The CDC rescinded the policy earlier this month, and it was expected to be phased out by May 23 before the federal judge announced his intent to block the recision.
Judge Robert Summerhays said he intends to issue a temporary restraining order in the case if the Justice Department and Arizona, Missouri and Louisiana, the three states that sued to pause the rollback, can come to an agreement.
A senior administration official told reporters the administration intends to comply with the temporary restraining order the judge intends to issue, but the administration disagrees with the premise of the restraining order. For now, the administration continues to prepare for the eventual end of Title 42. Mayorkas issued a memo on Tuesday outlining the objectives DHS plans to carry out regardless of when Title 42 comes to an end.
The six-part plan explains a variety of steps the administration has already started taking to prepare for a potential surge in migration. It involves surging resources to the border including medical supplies and personnel, speeding up case processing at CBP holding centers, working with NGOs to transition migrants from government custody to local communities and stepping up efforts to crack down on human smuggling organizations.
“I’ve been to the border approximately eight times and in my last visit I heard loudly and clearly the concerns of our heroic, incredibly dedicated Border Patrol agents about their need for additional support so that they can get out into the field and interdict individuals seeking to evade law enforcement and cross our border illegally,” Mayorkas told lawmakers.
The secretary testified that about 300 case processors have been contracted to increase capacity and move those who enter without authorization through the system.
“When the Title 42 public health order is lifted, we anticipate migration levels will increase, as smugglers will seek to take advantage of and profit from vulnerable migrants,” Mayorkas wrote in a prior memo titled, “DHS Plan for Southwest Border Security and Preparedness.”
DHS officials told reporters in March they could expect to see as many as 18,000 migrants along the southern border per day, when Title 42 gets lifted.
Mayorkas has stressed Title 42 is not an immigration policy, but rather born out of the public health crisis.
“We inherited an immigration system from the prior administration that had been studiously dismantled and so was unprepared to meet the challenges posed by the high numbers of non citizens arriving at our borders today,” according to a senior Administration official who briefed reporters on Tuesday.
In addition to the two hearings on Wednesday, Mayorkas goes in front of the House Judiciary Committee on Thursday.
Last week, Rep. Jim Jordan, an Ohio Republican, wrote to Mayorkas in anticipation of his testimony.
“The Biden Administration’s radical immigration policies have caused a humanitarian and security crisis along our southwest border,” Jordan wrote. “The American people deserve answers and accountability for the Biden Administration’s lawlessness along the southwest border.”
(WASHINGTON) — U.S. and Russian officials have been negotiating the prisoner swap for Trevor Reed for months, according to senior administration officials Wednesday, with talks intensifying in recent weeks amid concern about his health.
As the Marine veteran, held since August 2019, was released, he met with U.S. special presidential envoy for hostage affairs Roger Carstens — and was described by an administration official as being in “good spirits” — before traveling onward to the U.S., the officials said.
This diplomatic exchange continued even amid Russia’s war in Ukraine — but the senior administration officials made clear, the talks never touched on the war or U.S. sanctions.
There was not even senior-level U.S. official travel to Russia to negotiate the exchange, according to the officials.
“This is a discrete issue on which we were able to make an arrangement with the Russians. It represents no change — zero — to our approach to the appalling violence in Ukraine,” a senior administration official told reporters.
“Let me just emphasize this again because it’s so important — the discussion with the Russians that led to this exchange were strictly limited to these topics, not a broader diplomatic conversation or even the starting point,” they added.
Topics around the war “weren’t broached. They were never intended to be broached” during the high-stakes secrets talks, a second senior administration official said.
After months of talks, President Joe Biden made “a very hard decision” to commute the sentence of Konstantin Yaroshenko, a Russian drug smuggler convicted of conspiring to import cocaine into the U.S.
But the senior administration officials emphasized Yaroshenko was not pardoned, and argued he “has already paid a steep price in the U.S. justice system for his crime. In fact, he’s already served the majority of his sentence.”
Serving a nine-year sentence in a remote prison camp, Reed went on a second hunger strike in late March to protest his treatment, according to his family. After a reported exposure to tuberculosis in December, his family was increasingly concerned about reports he was coughing up blood or experiencing fevers, especially when he was transferred to a prison hospital on April 1.
Appearing publicly for the first time in months, Reed told a Russian court via video teleconference on April 12 that it had been two weeks since he’d coughed up blood or had a fever, but he said he wasn’t receiving medical care for a broken rib.
While American Paul Whelan, another Marine veteran, has been held longer than Reed, it was Reed’s failing health and his family and the U.S. government’s concern that led to his case being raised in the exchange.
The officials declined to say more about Reed’s condition now or when and where he is expected to arrive in the U.S., out of privacy concerns for him and his family.
Yaroshenko is in Russian custody now, they confirmed.
But they repeatedly emphasized the Biden administration’s commitment to securing the freedom of U.S. citizens unjustly detained around the world.
“We will continue to work on and attempt to find ways to address other cases as best we can,” the senior administration official said when asked about Whelan and American WNBA star Brittney Griner, detained in Russia since February.
Whelan was also a tourist in Russia when he was arrested on espionage charges that he, his family, and the U.S. government have said are spurious.
Whelan has been detained since December 2018 and was sentenced to 16 years in prison in June 2020 — transferred to a prison colony eight hours southeast of Moscow.
Olympic gold medalist Brittney Griner, has been held since being accused of having hashish oil in her suitcase while returning to Russia to play basketball.
She remains in pre-trial detention, with a court extending her detention until May 19.
(WASHINGTON) — A funeral for former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, the first woman to ever serve in that role, will be held Wednesday at the Washington National Cathedral in the nation’s capital.
The funeral is set to begin at 11 a.m. and will be streamed on ABC News Live.
Albright, who had cancer, died in March at the age of 84.
She served as secretary of state from 1997 to 2001 under President Bill Clinton after serving as the U.S. ambassador to the U.N. from 1993 to 1997.
During her tenure as secretary of state, she focused on promoting the eastward expansion of NATO and pushed for NATO intervention in the 1999 war in Kosovo, according to the historical office of the Department of State.
Her approach to diplomacy and statecraft was colored by her own experiences as a refugee who fled what was then Czechoslovakia with her family in the aftermath of World War II.
She remained engaged with both American and international affairs until the end of her life, writing a book in 2018 warning about a resurgence of fascism and sounding an alarm about Russian President Vladimir Putin in a New York Times op-ed published just before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
“In early 2000, I became the first senior U.S. official to meet with Vladimir Putin in his new capacity as acting president of Russia… Flying home, I recorded my impressions. ‘Putin is small and pale,’ I wrote, ‘so cold as to be almost reptilian,'” Albright wrote in the Times.
She added that “should he invade [Ukraine], it will be a historic error.”
Both former President Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will speak at the funeral, according to the Washington National Cathedral.
“Few leaders have been so perfectly suited for the times in which they served… Because she knew firsthand that America’s policy decisions had the power to make a difference in people’s lives around the world, she saw her jobs as both an obligation and an opportunity,” the former president wrote in a statement the day Albright died.
President Joe Biden will eulogize Albright at the funeral, and her daughters, Anne, Alice and Katie, will also speak.
(WASHINGTON) — Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on Wednesday is expected to get grilled by lawmakers about how the Biden administration is handling the growing problem of immigration at the U.S.-Mexico border.
On Monday, a federal judge in Louisiana briefly paused the rollback of Title 42 — the Trump-era policy that allowed migrants seeking asylum along the southern border to be expelled under the public health emergency authority of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — in order to stop the spread of COVID-19.
The CDC rescinded the policy earlier this month, and it was expected to be phased out by May 23.
Judge Robert Summerhays said he intends to issue a temporary restraining order in the case if the Justice Department and Arizona, Missouri and Louisiana, the three states that sued to pause the rollback, can come to an agreement.
A senior administration official told reporters the administration intends to comply with the temporary restraining order the judge intends to issue, but the administration disagrees with the premise.
“When the Title 42 public health order is lifted, we anticipate migration levels will increase, as smugglers will seek to take advantage of and profit from vulnerable migrants,” Mayorkas wrote in a memo titled, “DHS Plan for Southwest Border Security and Preparedness.”
DHS officials told reporters in March they could expect to see at least 18,000 migrants along the southern border per day, when Title 42 gets lifted.
Mayorkas has stressed Title 42 is not an immigration policy, but rather born out of the public health crisis.
Part of the border plan outlined in the memo, obtained by ABC News, is surging resources to the border, increasing processing efficiency and increasing non-government organizations to receive non-citizens after they’ve been processed by CBP.
“We inherited an immigration system from the prior administration that had been studiously dismantled and so was unprepared to meet the challenges posed by the high numbers of non citizens arriving at our borders today,” according to a Senior Administration official who briefed reporters on Tuesday.
In addition to the two hearings on Wednesday, Mayorkas will go in front of the House Judiciary Committee on Thursday.
Last week, Rep. Jim Jordan, an Ohio Republican, wrote to Mayorkas in anticipation of his hearing.
“The Biden Administration’s radical immigration policies have caused a humanitarian and security crisis along our southwest border,” Jordan wrote. “The American people deserve answers and accountability for the Biden Administration’s lawlessness along the southwest border.”
Kent Nishimura / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
(WASHINGTON) — House GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy was mum Tuesday night when questioned by reporters about being heard on tape saying some Republicans incited violence around the Jan. 6 Capitol attack — and that others could be kicked off social media platforms.
But lawmakers told ABC News they expect the California Republican to explain his reported remarks behind closed doors Wednesday morning when House Republicans gather for their first meeting of the week.
In a new report Tuesday, New York Times reporters Jonathan Martin and Alex Burns released recordings of McCarthy and other GOP leaders made in January 2021 after the riot, discussing comments made before and after the Capitol attack by far-right lawmakers and their concerns over how those comments could potentially provoke violence against other legislators.
“He’s putting people in jeopardy,” McCarthy said of Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., a Trump loyalist who criticized other Republicans for being insufficiently supportive of Trump, according to the recording of the Jan. 10 call published by The Times. “And he doesn’t need to be doing this. We saw what people would do in the Capitol, you know, and these people came prepared with rope, with everything else.”
McCarthy declined to answer multiple questions from reporters as he walked from his office to the House floor for votes Tuesday evening. But when asked by ABC News if he was worried about the comments jeopardizing his bid for speaker if Republicans retake the House in the upcoming midterm elections, he had a simple answer.
“Nope,” he said.
In the meantime, McCarthy’s colleagues are weighing the impact of his newly reported comments.
“He’s going to explain it, and we’ll go from there,” said Rep. Debbie Lesko, R-Ariz. “Let’s see what he says.”
“Trust is not a thing to be measured by one incident,” Rep. Clay Higgins, R-La., told ABC News.
Asked if he would support McCarthy for speaker if Republicans retake the House, Higgins said, “I certainly have a vote and we shall see.”
Rep. Mike Kelly, R-Pa., one of Trump’s first supporters in Congress, said “Oh my God, yes,” when asked if he trusted McCarthy.
Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., one of McCarthy’s loudest critics on Capitol Hill, said he “obviously showed an utter lack of leadership,” and “continues to defend people pushing false narratives, and that’s wrong.”
Gaetz tweeted out a statement blasting McCarthy and Rep. Steve Scalise, R-La., the GOP whip who suggested Gaetz’s comments were “potentially illegal,” according to the recording published by The Times.
“Rep. McCarthy and Rep. Scalise held views about President Trump and me that they shared on sniveling calls with Liz Cheney, not us,” Gaetz said.
“This is the behavior of weak men, not leaders,” he wrote. “While I was protecting President Trump from impeachment, they were protecting Liz Cheney from criticism.”
Earlier Tuesday, Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., a senior member of the House Freedom Caucus, told the conservative One America News Network that McCarthy’s recorded comments regarding social media accounts were “problematic” and “the most serious thing.”
“If he had just been honest and truthful with us way back then, this would not be an issue for us today,” Biggs said. “We don’t want it to be an issue because we don’t want it to be a distraction.”
Fox News host Tucker Carlson also criticized McCarthy on Tuesday, saying on his show, “Those are the tape-recorded words of Congressman Kevin McCarthy, a man who, in private, turns out, sounds like an MSNBC contributor.”
“And yet unless conservatives get their act together right away, Kevin McCarthy or one of his highly liberal allies … is very likely to be speaker of the House in January. That will mean we will have a Republican Congress led by a puppet of the Democratic Party,” Carlson said.
(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden announced Tuesday that he pardoned three people who have “demonstrated a commitment to rehabilitation,” including 86-year-old Abraham W. Bolden Sr., who was the first Black Secret Service agent to serve on a presidential detail.
The president also commuted the sentences of 75 people who are currently serving long sentences for non-violent drug offenses.
“America is a nation of laws and second chances, redemption, and rehabilitation. Elected officials on both sides of the aisle, faith leaders, civil rights advocates, and law enforcement leaders agree that our criminal justice system can and should reflect these core values that enable safer and stronger communities,” Biden said in a statement.
Tuesday’s action was the first time Biden used his clemency powers during his presidency and came after advocates and progressive Democrats urged the president to fulfill his long-awaited campaign promise to use his executive authority to address mass incarceration and racial disparities in the criminal justice system, a crisis that was accelerated through policies like the 1994 crime bill, sweeping legislation authored by then-Sen. Biden that experts now say disproportionately impacted people of color.
Biden touted his clemency executive action as “important progress.”
“My administration will continue to review clemency petitions and deliver reforms that advance equity and justice, provide second chances, and enhance the wellbeing and safety of all Americans,” the president said.
While advocates and criminal justice experts have praised Biden’s clemency actions, some experts told ABC News the measures fall short of ensuring a streamlined process to address the backlog of petitions requesting clemency grants to nonviolent offenders.
“It’s great that 78 people received clemency in some form today, but it fades into the background of 18,000 petitions pending on the President’s desk,” said Ames Grawert, senior counsel at the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law School. “The President needs to come up with a system for ensuring that those thousands of petitions receive a careful and thorough review and the attention they deserve. It’s not clear to me that the current process is up to the task.”
In addition to the clemency actions, the Biden administration released plans to expand economic opportunities and ease reentry for formerly incarcerated individuals.
The myriad of new measures include a $145 million investment in job training programs for convicted felons in Bureau of Prison facilities, which will be done through collaboration between the Department of Justice and the Department of Labor. The administration also plans to expand employment opportunities post release, access to small business loan investments, as well as higher education.
Analysis from a 2017 report from the National Reentry Resource Center reveals that evidence-based reentry policies and programs have been shown to improve the outcomes of formerly incarcerated individuals.
“The actions we’re taking today will have a real impact for someone trying to land a job, find a safe and affordable place to live with their children and get back on their feet,” Susan Rice, Domestic Policy Advisor for the Biden administration, said while praising the new measures during a White House Roundtable with formerly incarcerated Americans.
(WASHINGTON) — Capt. Samuel Choe, a former resident of Fort Gordon in Georgia, flew 17 hours from his deployment in South Korea to testify before a Senate subcommittee Tuesday about the mold exposure he said his family endured in private military housing and the chronic health issues suffered by his 8-year-old daughter, including a skin condition called severe atopic dermatitis — or severe eczema.
The degree of her condition, which he described as “potentially fatal,” had caused her to wake up in the middle of the night to parts of her body caked in blood from minor scratches or irritation, he said, adding that it would “haunt” his daughter “for the rest of our lives.”
“I do not recall ever seeing the type [of] conditions that we have lived under while we were at Fort Gordon,” said Choe, who has served in the military for 12 years and grew up in military housing with his parents.
Choe was among the family members and advocates who testified Tuesday at the Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations about what they said was mismanagement, neglect and abuse they suffered in private military housing paid for using defense appropriations funds for service members’ on-base accommodations.
Their concerns — focused on one of the Army, Air Force and Navy’s largest private housing providers, Balfour Beatty — ranged from environmental hazards, including unaddressed mold, to logistical failures leading to delayed repairs. In total, Balfour provides housing on 55 separate Army, Navy and Air Force bases across 26 states, with a total of over 43,000 on-base homes occupied by roughly 150,000 residents, according to the company.
The hearing was held hours after the subcommittee released a bipartisan “Mistreatment of Military Families in Privatized Housing” report detailing alleged negligent responses and deceitful practices by Balfour Beatty.
The same company pleaded guilty last year to fraud after a Department of Justice investigation that uncovered instances of falsified data in Balfour’s internal data management software. Artificially augmenting the number of resolved work orders allowed Balfour employees to receive larger bonuses — which at the time was part of the company’s financial compensation policy, the probe found.
The plea deal included a $65 million fine and three-year probation during which an independent compliance body monitors the company’s activity.
The report released Tuesday specifically examines conditions at Balfour housing units on Georgia’s Fort Gordon Army Base and Sheppard Air Force Base in Texas between late 2019 and early 2022.
Tech. Sgt. Jack Fe Torres, who said his wife and children also suffered a host of medical problems after being exposed to mold in a Balfour home at Sheppard Air Force Base also testified. The family’s issues began with an insufficient water heater repair, he said, which led to a flood and then to mold.
While trying to address this issue, Torres said he noticed that work orders submitted to Balfour on his family’s behalf were doctored to minimize the severity of the situation.
“At one point, we were told that a large spot of mold in our mechanical room wall was just a burn mark,” he said.
The hearing included interviews with over a dozen military families and former Balfour employees. Two Balfour executives, including President of Facility Operations, Renovation and Construction Richard Taylor, testified as well.
“I reject the suggestion that it’s a systemic failure,” he said in response to Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., detailing a host of concerns flagged by residents. Taylor suggested Choe’s daughter, for example, could have contracted her illness outside the home.
Paula Cook, Balfour’s vice president of military community management, said the company did all it could for its residents.
Both insisted they were not aware of the data manipulation that had occurred, insisted there was no longer fraudulent activity going on at Balfour and said the issues the company was accused of were isolated and unrelated. An unnamed third party now fields Balfour military housing complaint calls, they testified, and the company has a new system to keep Balfour on-site employees from editing work order histories.
At one point, Ossoff bluntly asked, “Did your senior executives know that for six years, the company was engaging in fraud?”
Taylor said that “no,” he did not.
Ossoff followed up: “Would you know now if your company was continuing to engage in fraud?”
(WASHINGTON) — Speaking publicly about his visit to Ukraine for the first time since returning home, Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Tuesday asserted “the Ukrainians have won the battle for Kyiv,” while calling for additional aid to help the country weather the war as the fighting shifts eastward and to the south.
“As we took the train across the border and rode westward into Ukraine, we saw mile after mile of Ukrainian countryside, territory that just a couple of months ago, the Russian government thought that it could seize in a matter of weeks. Today — firmly Ukraine’s,” he recounted, testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee about his secretive visit to heart of the war-torn country with Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin.
Blinken said that on the trip, the highest-level visit to Ukraine’s capital by U.S. officials since the invasion, evidence of its military success abounded.
“In Kyiv we saw the signs of a vibrant city coming back to life. People eating outside sitting on benches, strolling. It was right in front of us,” he said. “For all the suffering that they’ve endured, for all the carnage that Russia’s brutal invasion continues to inflict, Ukraine was and will continue to be a free and independent country.”
During the hearing, convened to review the State Department’s budget for the coming fiscal year, Blinken argued that fulfilling the funding requests would prove critical to Ukraine’s defense and curbing Russian aggression.
“I felt some pride in what the United States has done to support the Ukrainian government and its people and an even firmer conviction that we must not let up. Moscow’s war of aggression against Ukraine has underscored the power and purpose of American diplomacy,” he said. “We have to continue to drive that diplomacy forward to seize what I believe are strategic opportunities, as well as address risks presented by Russia’s overreach.”
Blinken argued support from the U.S. and its allies had already played a decisive role.
“[The Ukrainian people’s] success is primarily because of their incredible courage and determination, but it’s also because we were able to equip them with what they needed,” Blinken said. “For every tank that the Russians have had in Ukraine, we’ve managed with 30 allies and partners, in one way or another, to provide about 10 anti-armor systems. For every plane that the Russians have flown in the skies, there have been about 10 anti-aircraft munitions of one kind or another.”
But Blinken acknowledged that as the battleground shifted to other regions of the country, the Ukrainians’ strategy needed to evolve well.
“The nature of this battle is changing, to eastern and southern Ukraine. They’re adapting to that. We’re adapting to that.”
The secretary said while in Kyiv, he discussed what assistance Ukraine required for the next phase of the fighting with its President Zelensky and top military leader.
“I think we’re largely aligned in what they say they need and what we think we’re able to provide,” he said.
While the committee largely projected bipartisan support for Ukraine, the most contentious round of the hearing came during Sen. Rand Paul’s line of questioning on what he called the “reasons” behind Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Paul, a Republican more aligned with former President Donald Trump’s “America First” stance than the other members of his party on the committee, blamed the attack in part on President Joe Biden’s and other officials’ public support for Ukraine’s eventual NATO membership.
“Russia said it was a red line,” Paul stated. “Had they been, or are they to become part of NATO, that means U.S. troops will be fighting in Ukraine and that’s something I very much oppose.”
“My judgment is different,” Blinken countered, pointing out the countries Russia had targeted — like Georgia, Moldova, and Ukraine — were not part of NATO.
“You could also argue the countries they’ve attacked were part of Russia … well, we’re part of the Soviet Union,” Paul replied.
“That does not give Russia the right to attack them,” Blinken responded. “It is the fundamental right of these countries to decide their own future and their own destiny.”
Blinken also said that in the eyes of the department, the alliance was not Russian President Vladimir Putin’s chief concern ahead of the attack.
“This was never about Ukraine being potentially part of NATO,” he said. “It was always about his belief that Ukraine does not deserve to be a sovereign independent country that it must be re reassumed into Russia in one form or another.”
Blinken was also pressed on the State Department’s relatively slow-moving approach to repopulating the U.S. embassy in Kyiv after it was temporarily relocated in February, a step many of its allies have already taken.
“We are sending diplomats back to Ukraine this week, and they will begin to assess how we can most effectively and securely reopen the embassy in Kyiv. I anticipate that we will be in Lviv and then and then head to head to Kyiv, subject to the President’s final decision on that,” he said. “We want to have our embassy reopened and we’re working to do that.”
(WASHINGTON) — Madison Cawthorn, a Republican congressman from North Carolina, was caught trying to go through security with a loaded gun at Charlotte Douglas International Airport Tuesday morning, according to multiple sources.
This was the second time the controversial congressman has been stopped trying to bring a weapon through airport security.
TSA officers spotted the gun at the checkpoint and called airport police.
Individuals can face fines up to $13,000 for a second offense, according to TSA.
It was not immediately clear if Cawthorn faces any charges. The congressman’s office did not immediately respond to an ABC News request for comment.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
