We Need a Clear Policy on Ukraine, not Oligarchic Intrigue, on Tuesday

The next US administration will have enormous power to decide the endgame of Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, while polling consistently shows that a large majority of American voters side with Ukraine. Yet Ukraine policy has not featured significantly in the campaign of either party, with Kamala Harris hewing to existing policies and Donald Trump claiming he will achieve a rapid end to US involvement, promising to negotiate peace within 24 hours of election. Notably, Ukraine is not even mentioned on the platform section of the Trump campaign website or the GOP platform. This vacuum does a disservice to the American people as it prevents a public discussion of genuinely consequential issues such as the use of US long-range weapons to strike Russian territory. But it is also strategic corruption flypaper as former officials and lobbyists with ties to the Russian business world seek to impose their own policy solutions and at least one American oligarch, Elon Musk, has reportedly engaged in direct communications with top Russian officials and used his ownership of X to try to thwart US support of Ukraine at every turn. 

This is not a partisan issue and TDP does not endorse or oppose any candidate. Our focus is how actors – foreign and domestic – can hijack the democratic process. And Ukraine represents one of the most consequential issues of our lifetimes, not just in national security terms but the future of democracy itself. Notably, while America’s political divisions are stark, polling has demonstrated a remarkable and consistent public, cross-party consensus on the issue of Ukraine. A University of Maryland Critical Issues poll with SSRS, conducted in August, found that 62% of respondents, including majorities of voters identifying with both parties, expressed more sympathy with Ukraine than Russia (a mere 2% favored Russia). And a significant 48% (including 37% of Republicans) agreed with the statement that the US should support Ukraine as long as the conflict lasts. This should be the starting point for a grown-up, public discussion of the choices facing the next administration. 

It is important to define terms. What is America’s Ukraine policy? In early September, the Biden administration sent a classified report outlining its strategy for Ukraine, months after the original June deadline. The report was a deliverable from the US$95 billion supplemental spending bill in April – itself subject to months of delays – that included US$61 billion in funding for Ukraine. (Even this has been subject to delays, with Volodymyr Zelensky saying this week that only 10% of this aid has been delivered so far, due to “bureaucracy and logistics”.) The delays in delivering both a strategy and aid are telling. As analyst Mick Ryan, a retired Australian army major general, noted at the time: “Given the war is now in its 31st month, the lack of a strategy until now says much about the prevarication and strategic timidity demonstrated during the war by many (but not all) of Kyiv’s backers.” He further notes that, until now, the US has not had a clear strategy, rather it is engaged in “crisis management”.

Is there a Harris or Trump doctrine?

While there is no publicly articulated strategy for either victory or negotiations, the Biden administration has set out some clear priorities, including: providing bilateral economic and military assistance to Ukraine, rallying international support for Ukraine, imposing economic sanctions on Russia and avoiding a direct military confrontation between NATO in Russia. When Ukraine first repelled Russian forces from Kyiv and then regained territory in 2022 and early 2023, it appeared the administration was focused on a restoration of Ukraine’s pre-invasion borders, if not the recovery of territory, like Crimea, occupied in 2014. But nearly a year ago, even before the bitter battlefield setbacks of recent months, Politico reported that strategy had changed to a more “defensive posture” aimed at positioning Kyiv as strongly as possible for future negotiations. 

Harris’ primary intervention on Ukraine since declaring her candidacy in August came after meeting President Zelensky in September. Her message was in line with the administration’s publicly articulated policy of supporting Ukrainian territorial integrity, while not promoting tactical or strategic solutions, such as increasing deliveries of aircraft or long-range weapons capable of disrupting Russia’s war effort. A review of her statements on Ukraine since becoming a candidate has not found any notable departure or sense of urgency. Simply put, her remarks after the Zelensky meeting suggested a continued status quo that appears predicated on preventing a Russian victory but not ensuring Ukrainian one: “There are some in my country who would instead force Ukraine to give up large parts of its sovereign territory, who would demand that Ukraine accept neutrality, and would require Ukraine to forgo security relationships with other nations. These proposals are the same as those of Putin, and let us be clear, they are not proposals for peace.”

Harris’s statement was a clear swipe at Donald Trump and his running mate, J.D. Vance. The former president has claimed repeatedly – at least since May 2023 – that he’d settle the war within 24 hours of being elected (Russia’s UN ambassador dismissed this idea in July, saying “the Ukrainian crisis cannot be solved in one day”.) Vance has built on this conceit, saying in recent weeks that Ukraine would need to come to the table, give up territory and agree to a demilitarized zone. It is unclear if these policies are the result of a careful analysis of the situation or a reactive stance, as the campaign and the GOP have not articulated any written policy on Ukraine. Notably, the pro-Trump America First Policy Institute (AFPI) put out a policy paper in April entitled “America First, Russia, & Ukraine,” that sought to put some meat on the negotiations strategy, although the campaign hasn’t endorsed the document. Meanwhile, there’s no sign that policies on Russia and Ukraine have been discussed with the Republican senators who are most hawkish on Russia, like Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), whose primary recent concern was that Zelensky not offend Trump. It is possible, however, that Trump has discussed this issue with Vladimir Putin, with journalist Bob Woodward reporting that Trump and Putin have spoken seven times since the former left office in January 2021. 

Dangerous freelancing

The absence of a robust policy direction from the White House and Harris campaign and the apparently improvised nature of Trump’s policy on Ukraine has left the door open for other actors to try and drive policy. This strategic corruption risk is very real and it has arguably played out throughout 2024. In July 2024, former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, a Trump campaign surrogate, and David Urban, managing director at lobbying behemoth BGR Group, proposed “A Trump Peace Plan for Ukraine” on the editorial page of the Wall Street Journal. Quite aside from whether Pompeo’s thinking has any purchase with Trump, the real problem posed by the op-ed, as Eli Clifton, a senior advisor at the Quincy Institute, noted, is that its writers failed to disclose significant potential conflicts of interest. Clifton was referring to potential weapons contracts generated by the policy goals in the op-ed. But Pompeo’s role as a director of Ukrainian mobile operator Kyivstar, and of its parent company VEON, is also a potential conflict as it puts him on the indirect payroll of LetterOne, VEON’s largest shareholder. LetterOne (which OFAC takes great pains to say is specifically not designated) has several prominent (and prodigiously litigious) Russian shareholders. Some of these same shareholders are also involved in a US$1 billion claim filed with the International Center for Settlement of Investment Disputes in January 2024 against Ukraine for the nationalization of Alfa Bank’s Ukraine unit after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. 

But Pompeo’s potential conflicts pale in comparison to the actions of Elon Musk. In early 2024, Musk used his platform to livestream political opposition to Ukrainian aid. Earlier this month, the WSJ and other outlets reported that Musk has been in regular contact with Vladimir Putin and his deputy, Sergei Kirieynko (whose son runs the pro-Kremlin Russian social network Vkontakte). In the meantime, Russian forces continue to make ample use of SpaceX’s Starlink system as Ukrainians and others wonder aloud if Musk, given his overt sympathies for Russia, and in light of his decision to cut off Ukraine’s access to the system ahead of a pivotal 2022 attack on Russia’s Black Sea fleet, has any desire to crack down on the illicit use of the terminals. The extent of Musk’s true influence over the Trump campaign is far from clear, but Trump told Fox News that he’d appoint him as “Secretary of Cost-Cutting”. What seems more apparent is that Musk has at least as much of Trump’s attention as any hawkish GOP senator, and his schemes, such as a US$1 million giveaway to voters (dubbed “indisputably an unlawful lottery” by Philadelphia’s district attorney) by his political action committee will only endear him to the mercurial candidate. 

Yet the potential hijacking of Ukraine policy by people with direct links to Russia’s government or its oligarchs is mainly made possible by the unwillingness of the current administration – ranging from Treasury to Justice – to take action to enforce existing laws and go after strategic corruption. In Pompeo’s case, the WSJ failed to make important disclosures, a disservice to its readers, not a crime. And Musk’s X platform (the funding for which ranges from the Saudis to the sons of Russian oligarchs), like other social media sites, uses the fig leaf of Section 230 of the Telecommunications Act to evade prosecution for incitement, even as threats to FEMA workers impeded relief efforts amid a torrent of misinformation on multiple social networks after Hurricane Helene. But SpaceX and Tesla are huge government contractors, and if Musk himself does not fall under the Hatch Act (barring federal employees from pursuing their own foreign policies), his apparent dealings with the Russian presidential administration should open his companies to debarment from US government business. His failure to block Russia from using Starlink should also be a subject of urgent government investigation and measures if its response is found to be deficient. The Democrats like to say that democracy is on the ballot on Tuesday. The bigger picture is that, for decades, administrations of both parties have failed to enforce the rule of law on the political and business elite – failing to prosecute even widely publicized alleged sanctions evasion, failing to go after flagrant violations of the Foreign Agents Registration Act (just 45 successful prosecutions since 1939), failing to hold any technology company responsible for incitement – including acting as platforms for organizing Charlottesville and January 6, failing to hold Supreme Court justices to ethics guidelines as they weaken already weak safeguards against public corruption  – is why we are in this perilous state. As law enforcement has slipped, we expose our politics and policies to undue influence. As Bob Kagan said to Tim Miller this week, “Capitalism depends on the rule of law. Capitalists do not.”  Meanwhile, Ukrainians, who continue to pay in their own blood each day for freedom do not see promised aid delivered while candidates muse aloud about forcing them to surrender territory and the world’s richest man, who happens to be a major US government contractor, casually discusses his next steps with the Russian president. We must do better.