Funding Ukraine: An Unnecessary Evil

May 18, 2024

–Contributors Flor Blanco and J. Bradley

As May 21, 2024, approaches, the question as to what role Volodymyr Zelenskyy has in Ukraine grows stronger. Afterall, Zelenskyy’s move to skip elections in Ukraine due to martial law was potentially illegal, which was suggested in the recent article covered by Uncensored Beat.¹

Despite claims from popular US media that Ukrainians were not prepared to have elections in March,² a case was filed in the Supreme Court of Ukraine against the Verkhovna Rada, the Ukrainian Parliament, for illegally withholding elections from the people. The Supreme Court of Ukraine opened proceedings of this case on May 2, 2024. The plaintiff who filed the case claims that the government’s move to suspend the Ukrainian presidential election should be ruled as illegal and demands that the Parliament be forced to schedule a new date for holding the election. ^2,3

Zelensky’s Seemingly Fraudulent Election as President

Zelenskyy’s rise to power is an example of the negative impacts of electing someone based upon a populist platform. Sources say that Zelenskyy did not intend to run for president at the time when his political party filed in 2017. The party was named after the show he starred in titled “Servant of the People.” ⁴

The document shown with this article (Figure 1), is a copy of the initial filing of Servant of the People as a political party. It has no record of a presidential candidate but has 400 candidates running for Parliament. Sources say that the filing also did not have the required number of minimal endorsements from different Ukrainian regional organizations that were needed to make the party official . The Ministry of Justice of Ukraine only registered one city party organization in Kryvyi Rih, although the law mandated at least 14 such organizations. As a result, the congress of the Servant of the People party and Zelenskyy’s nomination did not comply with Ukraine’s electoral legislation. The event to formally recognize the new party didn’t meet the criteria of a congress; it was more of a gathering organized by the “Kvartal-95,” as a mini television entertainment production show, lacking adherence to basic Ukrainian legislative norms. This brings to question whether any candidate from that party, including Zelenskyy, should hold a seat in the government.

Evidence of this issue is loosely mentioned in a post-election report performed by the Parliament Assembly of the Council of Europe, or PACE, which referenced last-minute changes to election law, actions that tossed aside parliamentary procedures and an overall lack of transparency in the Ukrainian election process.⁵ Additional evidence is sited in a publication referring to the changes to the election code, which Zelenskyy implemented in 2019, just a few months after taking office. The document stated that the changes to election processes for Ukraine did not allow parties to fully comply with the minimal legal requirements to nominate candidates, including for those from the Servant of the People party.⁶ Regardless of these gaps, it was well perceived that Ukraine had yet to accomplish the goal of holding a “true democratic” election. As a result, these shortcomings were ignored, and the 2019 election was observed by the West to be one that the most democratic races since Ukraine’s conception as nation in 1991.⁶

When Zelenskyy filed as a presidential candidate in December 2018, just three months prior to the first round of elections in Ukraine, he ran as a leader of the people.^4,7 He made statements such as, “’If I am the president, this means that everyone who voted for me is also the president. Anyone can be a president’”.⁷ Zelenskyy’s approach was successful. Many Ukrainians who supported Zelenskyy in 2019 were tired of the corruption resulting from the former president and were enamored by Zelenskyy’s populist approach.⁷ Sources say that the citizens disputing Zelenskyy’s election were relatively quiet, and there was minimal awareness or attention from the Western world regarding the disputed election. Zelenskyy’s support by Russian oligarchs were also overlooked. The West hailed the election of Ukrainian President Zelenskyy as a triumph of democracy.⁵

When Russia invaded democratic Ukraine, the situation shifted dramatically from a democracy to a stark display of authoritarianism under the new President. Despite intentions to emulate the values of Western civilizations, the country found itself under the grip of authoritarian rule.

US Funding of Ukraine and the Ukraine Elections

As we fast forward to current events in the US, the American population was mostly unaware of elections in Ukraine. In contrast, the US government knew about Zelenskyy’s decision not to hold elections. In fact, the House Majority Speaker, Mike Johnson, was attempting to use the issue as a means to block funding for Ukraine.^8,9

Despite the US House of Representatives recently approving more funding to Ukraine, the House should have considered Speaker Johnson’s hesitation more seriously. ¹⁰ Zelenskyy’s potentially illegal dismissal of elections could be a violation of US foreign aid policy specific to regions that were formerly part of the Soviet Union. Those policies appear to require that those countries preserve and support democratic systems before any US aid can be given to them.^11,12,13 The acts include:

Foreign Assistance Act of 1961
Freedom for Russia and Emerging Eurasian Democracies and Open Markets Support Act of 1992

Unlike the Arms Export Act that is specific to military types of aid, these foreign aid acts do not appear to have clauses which are restrained by national interests. Instead, the language suggests a very strong requirement that the countries receiving the aid uphold democracy.^12-14 This discovery questions Congress’s willingness to comply with the laws they implement even if it requires a diversion from bipartisanship.

Some recent reports suggest that the US Secretary of State Blinken is inquiring and advising the Ukrainian government about scheduling elections, which suggests some validity to the above issues.³ This is a stark contrast to the videos on social media a few days prior showing Blinken enjoying pizza and playing in a rock band, which displays the gravity of his attention to end the Ukraine-Russian conflict.

Additional Potential Violations

A recent poll shows a shift in US popular support of funding Ukraine.¹⁵Although many factors may be influencing this shift, some of the most impactful factors seem to be given less attention than the congressional battles between right and left. These factors include unfavorable findings from a recent GAO audit of foreign funds to Ukraine and an investigative report showing evidence of US arms which were given as aid being sold on the Ukrainian market to other countries. Both reports were published in December 2023.^16,17