Senate hopefuls mostly unified on Ukraine aid

East Bay Rep. Barbara Lee was famously the lone vote against authorizing war after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, and has long railed against the U.S supporting “forever wars.” But on Friday, her Oakland office will be picketed by antiwar group Code Pink Women for Peace. The reason: Lee’s support of U.S. involvement in the Ukraine-Russia war.

Lee, who is running for Senate, told The Chronicle’s “It’s All Political on Fifth & Mission” podcast this week that her support for Ukraine “is not something that I’m ashamed to talk about.” She expressed concern, in particular, about getting resources to pregnant Ukrainian women “who were raped by the Russian soldiers” but who “can’t get an abortion in Poland.”

“You can’t tell me that (Russian President Vladimir) Putin is not on the move. You can’t tell me that he is not committing war crimes,” said Lee, who said she has visited Ukraine and Poland “many times.” “And so I’ve seen it, I know what’s going on there.”

Lee said U.S. support is needed because “this is a fight not only to preserve democracy, but it’s a fight to make sure that the United States is on the right side of history and provides the resources, the economic resources, the humanitarian resources, so that Ukrainian people can live in peace and insecurity. Right now, we’ve got to help them.”

Lee and the other Democratic Senate candidates — Reps. Katie Porter and Adam Schiff — are largely in agreement with President Biden on the first anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. During Biden’s surprise secret visit to Ukraine this week, he said — while standing next to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy — that “it was critical that there not be any doubt, none whatsoever, about U.S. support for Ukraine in the war.”

The price tag for that support has been steep: The U.S. spent $112 billion on military and economic support for Ukraine last year.

On Tuesday, Putin ramped up concerns about the war escalating into nuclear conflict when he said he would suspend his nation’s involvement in the New START treaty, an arms control agreement between Russia and the U.S. that expires in February 2026.

Cynthia Papermaster, a San Francisco Bay Area organizer for the nationwide anti-war group Code Pink Women for Peace, is “very disappointed with Barbara Lee,” for her support of the war. The organization plans to have a picket line and news conference Friday in front of Lee’s Oakland office.

“I’m very puzzled by Barbara Lee and Katie Porter, who are calling themselves progressives and yet being pro-war,” said Papermaster, who said she personally wouldn’t support Schiff for Senate because he is not progressive enough.

Papermaster, who backs a diplomatic resolution to the war, blasted the Democratic Senate candidates — and Lee in particular, who is her House representative — for supporting billions in military aid while “many people in her district are struggling to make ends meet. We have a huge houseless population in her district. We have children going to bed hungry every night. We have people struggling to put food on the table. We have people struggling with inflation.”

Nevertheless, the Democrats stand by their support for Ukraine.

Schiff traveled to Kyiv last year with then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi and met with Zelenskyy and his national security team. The visit clarified to the Burbank Democrat why the U.S. needed to stop this “naked act of aggression by Putin and Russia, which seek to remake the map of Europe by military force,” Schiff told The Chronicle in a statement. “If Russia is successful, it will embolden other aggressor nations to use force to conquer the territory of their neighbors.”

Porter, who represents parts of Orange County, said “standing up to Vladimir Putin’s lawlessness is a good investment for America and for the world. I support continued aid to Ukraine to protect democracy.”

But Porter drew a line, telling The Chronicle that while she supports aid, “that doesn’t mean we should be issuing blank checks to the Pentagon. We need robust oversight to verify taxpayer dollars are being spent wisely, and that the desires of special interests, including big defense contractors, do not come before the needs of the American people.”

All three Democrats opposed this year’s National Defense Authorization Act, which funds the military, saying that the budget was bloated and called for more funding than even Biden wanted. The candidates also were united in opposing sending U.S. troops to the region.

“I don’t think we’ll get there,” Lee told The Chronicle, saying that she bases that position on the many congressional briefings she has attended on the war. “You know, me, I’m not going to allow for unfettered war.”

But determining what constitutes unfettered war can be tricky. Porter wants tough oversight on U.S. involvement.

Porter wants “Congress to review aid to Ukraine and make the decision to reauthorize it on a regular basis. It can’t be and is not an open-ended commitment,” Porter Senate campaign spokesperson Lindsay Reilly said Wednesday.

Schiff was more declarative that he supports the war until it ends.

Schiff said, “We have a strong national security interest in defending fellow democracies like Ukraine. U.S. and international support will be necessary until Putin ends this war of choice, and we have helped Ukraine move forward.”

Lee, long a critic of the U.S. military budget, is keeping an eye on how much the war is costing — but doesn’t see pulling U.S. support now, when the Ukrainian people need it.

Lee said the U.S. needs to “know what we’re doing in terms of how we calibrate and how we balance the budget.”

“I’ll continue to support it,” Lee said. “We certainly can’t leave (Ukraine) out there and we certainly can’t not support the efforts of the Ukrainian people right now.”

Reach Joe Garofoli: jgarofoli@sfchronicle.com; Twitter: @joegarofoli