Walz and other governors pledge support in call with Ukrainian president

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and more than two dozen other governors participated in a video call Tuesday morning with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who asked for their continued support as the Russian invasion of his country stretches on past the one-year mark.

The virtual meeting, hosted by the National Governors Association, comes as some Republicans in Congress and elsewhere have questioned whether the United States should stop or scale back its support to Ukraine.

"We can use the platform that we have to make it clear that this is not only a humanitarian issue to stand with Ukraine, it's a national security issue for us, because Russia will not stop there," Walz said Tuesday after the call.

Both Republican and Democratic governors participated in the call, which wasn't shared with the media. After the call, National Governors Association Chair Phil Murphy and Vice Chair Spencer Cox said governors in both parties reiterated their support for Ukraine.

"We should always be very careful about where we're spending our tax dollars and what we're getting for that," said Cox, the Republican governor of Utah. "But there's a very unified front as we meet as governors, and — if you look at polling among Republicans and the Republican Party — that, by and large, there's still support for Ukraine."

While much of Ukraine's aid has come from the federal government, businesses and defense contractors in other states are making the weapons that have protected Ukrainians. Minnesota volunteers have sent thousands of vital medical supplies to the front lines in Ukraine.

"He made the point that this isn't just a Ukraine war, this is an existential threat to freedoms everywhere, to our values everywhere, including very much the United States," said Murphy, New Jersey's Democratic governor, who said state leaders can use their "bully pulpit" to remind Americans of "why we're in this fight."

Minnesota got a specific shoutout by Zelenskyy as one of the states that moved quickly after the war began to cut financial ties with Russia, Walz said. In March of 2022, Walz ordered more than two dozen state agencies to terminate any contracts with Russian entities and refrain from entering into any new contracts.

Walz said Zelenskyy had a very "sophisticated message" that aimed to send hope to Ukrainian Americans living in states throughout the U.S. while rallying the nation's governors to their side.

Walz said he was encouraged by the news Tuesday that Finland joined the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), expanding the military alliance's border with Russia, as well as the fact that 29 governors from both parties were on the call.

"Some have seen this — for some weird reason — as a political opportunity to say that we shouldn't be helping," Walz said. "I think we all know what the risk is."