During a recent Senate Armed Service Committee session, Senator Angus King (I-ME) pushed Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth, on the War Department’s decision to end Ukraine military funding. Under the current proposed War Department budget, funding for the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative (USAI), will effectively stop.

Sen. King, a long time supporter of US involvement in Ukraine, criticized the decision and presented a bar graph showing US aid for Ukraine being replaced with EU aid over time.

Sec. Hegseth, embracing Sen. King’s graph, stated “I think that’s a beautiful chart. I think that’s exactly what we want.”.

Hegseth also emphasized the importance of wealthy European countries, that are more directly effected by the on-going conflict be responsible for Ukraine’s defense.

 

 

Sen. King’s office released a press release following the hearing explaining that…

“U.S. Senator Angus King… today raised concerns regarding the administration’s decision to abandon Ukraine by zeroing out military and humanitarian support in this year’s Department of Defense (DoD) budget despite widespread American support for continued financial and military assistance.”

A link provided to a YouGov poll from February 2026 showed that 31% of US citizens (1,550 total respondents) supported increasing military aid to Ukraine and 22% supported maintaining the same amount. The actual poll results also showed that of those 31% in support of increasing aid, 55% voted for Kamala Harris and only 14% voted for Donald Trump.

The same poll also showed that 51% of respondents were unsure that Ukraine, in a year from now, would still be an independent country.

 

–TMP