A Democrat-led effort to stop the Biden administration from transferring cluster munitions to Ukraine is turning into a bipartisan effort, with Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) offering to be the Republican co-sponsor on the effort.
Ms. Omar said, “If the U.S. is going to be a leader on international human rights, we must not participate in human rights abuses.”
On Monday, Mr. Gaetz volunteered to be the Republican co-sponsor on Ms. Jacobs’s amendment.
Mr. Gaetz noted he'd criticized Ms. Jacobs “a great deal” in the past, but saw her opposition to sending cluster munitions to Ukraine as a common-ground issue.
“I’m here to tell you is that I’m going to be the Republican co-sponsor of the Jacobs amendment before the House Rules Committee,” he added. “We have an opportunity, with bipartisanship, to stand against the warmongering Bidens.”
The risk of cluster munitions leaving behind small unexploded bomblets that are hard to track raises the concern that these bomblets may be triggered by innocent civilians later on. Mr. Gaetz said these cluster munitions have been used throughout “the world’s bloodiest and most inhumane wars” in places like Laos, Lebanon, Afghanistan, Yemen, and Syria.
Bipartisan Support, Opposition For Cluster Munitions Transfer
It remains to be seen which lawmakers will join in support of Ms. Jacobs’s amendment. Several other Democratic lawmakers have spoken in opposition to the transfer of DPICMs to Ukraine, including Reps. Chrissy Houlahan (D-Pa.), Jim McGovern (D-Mass.), Betty McCollum (D-Minn.), and Barbara Lee (D-Calif.).While the opposition to the cluster munitions transfer is bipartisan, so is the support.
Rep. Mike McCaul (R-Texas), the chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, had supported transfers of cluster munitions to Ukraine for months. In an interview with CNN on Sunday, Mr. McCaul said the weapons “would be a game-changer” for Ukraine.
“Russia is dropping with impunity cluster bombs in Ukraine, in the country of Ukraine right now,“ Mr. McCaul told CNN. ”All the Ukrainians and [Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy] are asking for is to give them the same weapons the Russians have to use in their own country against Russians who are in their own country. They do not want these to be used in Russia. They want these as self-defense to use against Russians.
In an interview with Fox News on Sunday, Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) said he had “some real qualms” about the plan to send cluster munitions to Ukraine, but had been reassured by the Biden administration that they'd taken enough steps to minimize the risk to civilians.
“It causes me some concern but I do appreciate that the Biden administration has really grappled with the risks and reached agreements with the Ukrainian military about using these munitions in a way to dislodge the Russian military while minimizing risks to Ukrainian civilians,” he said.
While announcing the decision to start transferring cluster munitions to Ukraine on Friday, national security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters that the military had selected DPICMs with a “dud rate” of no more than 2.5 percent, meaning there'd be a relatively low chance of submunitions failing to explode when they’re initially released. Mr. Sullivan said Russian cluster munitions, by comparison, have a dud rate of between 30 and 40 percent.
“We recognize that cluster munitions create a risk of civilian harm from unexploded ordnance,” Mr. Sullivan said. “This is why we’ve deferred—deferred the decision for as long as we could. But there is also a massive risk of civilian harm if Russian troops and tanks roll over Ukrainian positions and take more Ukrainian territory and subjugate more Ukrainian civilians because Ukraine does not have enough artillery. That is intolerable to us.”