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Few issues have been more divisive among the Republican presidential candidates than the war in Ukraine and how, if at all, the United States should be involved.

It has illuminated one of the biggest ideological divides within the Republican Party: between traditional members who see the United States as having a significant role to play in world affairs, and an anti-interventionist wing that sees foreign involvement as a distraction from more important issues at home.

The old school has more adherents in the 2024 field, including Nikki Haley, Mike Pence and Tim Scott, who support sending Ukraine military equipment and weapons but not troops. This aligns with President Bidens strategy, though they maintain that Mr. Biden is executing it wrong.

But the anti-interventionist wing is dominant in terms of influence, with two members, Donald J. Trump and Ron DeSantis, far outpolling everybody else.

Only one candidate, Will Hurd, wants to significantly expand U.S. involvement.

Former President Donald J. Trump has said that the war in Ukraine is not of vital importance to the United States.

In a CNN town hall event, he did not give a straight answer when asked repeatedly whether he would continue to provide military aid, instead declaring that he would end the war within 24 hours by meeting with Presidents Vladimir V. Putin of Russia and Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine. He claimed falsely that the United States was sending so much equipment that we dont have ammunition for ourselves.

Mr. Trump who was impeached in 2019 for withholding aid to Ukraine to pressure Mr. Zelensky to help him electorally also suggested to Fox News that he could have prevented the war by ceding Ukrainian land to Russia. I couldve made a deal to take over something, he said. There are certain areas that are Russian-speaking areas, frankly.

Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida has called the war a territorial dispute whose outcome does not materially affect the United States.

While the U.S. has many vital national interests securing our borders, addressing the crisis of readiness with our military, achieving energy security and independence, and checking the economic, cultural and military power of the Chinese Communist Party becoming further entangled in a territorial dispute between Ukraine and Russia is not one of them, he told the Fox News host Tucker Carlson in March.

After criticism from fellow Republicans, he backtracked, saying that his comments had been mischaracterized and that Russias invasion was wrong.

He has since endorsed a cease-fire, saying he wants to avoid a situation where you just have mass casualties, mass expense and end up with a stalemate. He has maintained his position that the United States should not get more involved.

The entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy opposes aid to Ukraine because, he argues, the war does not affect American interests.

He says he would pursue an agreement that would offer sweeping concessions to Mr. Putin, including ceding most of Ukraines Donbas region to Russia, lifting sanctions, closing all U.S. military bases in Eastern Europe and barring Ukraine from NATO. In exchange, he would require Russia to end its military alliance with China and rejoin the START nuclear treaty.

I dont think it is preferable for Russia to be able to invade a sovereign country that is its neighbor, but I think the job of the U.S. president is to look after American interests, and what I think the No. 1 threat to the U.S. military is right now, our top military threat, is the Sino-Russian alliance, Mr. Ramaswamy told ABC News. I think that by fighting further in Russia, by further arming Ukraine, we are driving Russia into Chinas hands.

Nikki Haley, a former ambassador to the United Nations, says that it is in the best interest of America for Ukraine to repel Russias invasion, and that she would continue sending equipment and ammunition.

A win for Ukraine is a win for all of us, because tyrants tell us exactly what theyre going to do, she said on CNN. She added: China says Taiwans next wed better believe them. Russia said Poland and the Baltics are next if that happens, were looking at a world war. This is about preventing war.

Victory for Ukraine, Ms. Haley said, would send a message more broadly: warning China against invading Taiwan, Iran against building a nuclear bomb, and North Korea against testing more ballistic missiles. To Russia, it would signal that its over.

In a speech at the American Enterprise Institute, she said President Biden had been far too slow and weak in helping Ukraine.

Former Vice President Mike Pence supports aid to Ukraine and has accused Mr. Biden of not supplying it quickly enough. In June, he was the first Republican candidate to travel to Ukraine, where he met with Mr. Zelensky.

Like Ms. Haley, he has described helping Ukraine as a way to show China that the United States and the West will not tolerate the use of military force to redraw international lines, a reference to a possible Chinese invasion of Taiwan.

This position sets him apart from the president he served under. Criticizing Mr. Trumps description of Mr. Putin as a genius, Mr. Pence said on CNN that he knew the difference between a genius and a war criminal.

He has emphasized that he would never send American troops to Ukraine, and said he did not yet want to admit Ukraine to NATO because he wanted to prevent the United States from becoming obligated to send troops. But he said he was open to admitting the country into NATO after the war.

Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina supports aid to Ukraine and told NBC News that Mr. Biden had done a terrible job explaining and articulating to the American people what the United States interests are there, an argument Mr. Pence has also made.

First, it prevents or reduces attacks on the homeland, Mr. Scott said. Second, as part of NATO and land being contiguous to Ukraine, it will reduce the likelihood that Russia will have the weaponry or the will to attack on NATO territory, which would get us involved.

He has endorsed a forceful defense of Ukraine from the start, writing in March 2022 that the fight was for the principles that America has always championed. That May, he voted for an emergency funding measure that went beyond what Mr. Biden proposed. He accused Mr. Biden of waiting too long to provide too little support, but Mr. Biden supported the increase.

Former Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey has said that the United States should continue to support Ukraine until the war is resolved.

None of us like the idea that theres a war going on and that were supporting it, but the alternative is for the Chinese to take over, the Russians, the Iranians and the North Koreans, Mr. Christie said in a CNN town hall, calling the conflict a proxy war with China.

He added that some kind of compromise with Russia might eventually be needed, and that the United States should help negotiate it once Ukraine can protect the land thats been taken by Russia in this latest incursion.

He has said that Mr. Trump set the groundwork for the war and called him Putins puppet. And he compared Mr. DeSantis to Neville Chamberlain, the British prime minister who tried to appease Hitler.

Former Gov. Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas supports aid to Ukraine with audits to ensure funds are used as intended. He told C-SPAN that U.S. leadership was important in supporting Ukraine and bringing the European allies together against Russia, and that he disagreed with Mr. Trumps and Mr. DeSantiss more isolationist view.

Like several other candidates, he has argued that allowing Russia to win would embolden it and other authoritarian countries to attack elsewhere.

If we stand by and let this nation falter, it leaves a hostile Russia on the doorstep of our NATO allies, he said, adding, By taking a supportive and public stand in Ukraine, were sending a message to Russia and to China that their aggressive posture towards other nation-states is unacceptable.

Gov. Doug Burgum of North Dakota has indicated that he supports military aid with accountability on every dollar.

Russia cannot have a win coming out of this, because if its a win for them, its a win for China, Mr. Burgum told KFYR, a television station in North Dakota, while adding that he wanted Europe to shoulder more of the financial burden.

He told CNN in June that the domestic turmoil in Russia had created an opening that the United States and NATO could exploit. Lets give them the support they need, he said of Ukraine, without elaborating. Lets get this war over now instead of having it be protracted.

Mayor Francis X. Suarez of Miami supports aid but wants to tie it to new NATO rules requiring Europe to carry an equal burden.

In a National Review essay, he said Mayor Vitali Klitschko of Kyiv had warned him that if Mr. Putin was not stopped, Russia and China would continue to attack the West, possibly including the United States. Mr. Suarez added that Russia had to be defeated because it was part of a broader resurgence of communist-inspired regimes, though Mr. Putins Russia is not communist.

Without naming him, Mr. Suarez criticized Mr. DeSantiss position. It doesnt take a Harvard lawyer to see that the war in Ukraine is not a territorial dispute, he wrote, shortly after Mr. DeSantis used that phrase to describe it. It is a moral and geopolitical struggle between two visions of the world.

Former Representative Will Hurd of Texas who said from the start that the United States should send Ukraine as much weaponry as we can has espoused a more hawkish policy than any other major candidate, arguing that the United States should go well beyond providing equipment and weapons.

Mr. Hurd told ABC News that he supported establishing and helping enforce a no-fly zone over Ukraine. NATO leaders and U.S. lawmakers from both parties rejected that last year, saying they feared escalation. Mr. Hurd has brushed that concern aside, arguing that Mr. Putin had not escalated when a mercenary leader threatened a coup.

He said that the United States should help Ukraine retake not only the territory Russia invaded in 2022, but also Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014.

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Hi rulers! This week I learned that, in many hunter gather societies, women hunted just as much as men. My female hunter ancestors would probably be embarrassed to know that Ive been vegetarian for 14 years. Lets get to it!

Young women are increasingly voting for Democrats. The GOP agrees that they need to fix that now they just need to agree on how.

In the 2022 midterms, young women broke hard for Democratic candidates. According to CNN exit polling, 72 percent of women between the ages of 18-29 voted Democratic in house races nationwide, compared to 26 percent of young women who voted for Republicans. (Polling data for the 2018 midterms doesnt break down age and gender, but 59 percent of women of all ages voted for Democrats in house races that year.) Meanwhile, the percentage of young women who identify as liberal has been steadily increasing for the last several years.

Republicans strategists say if the GOP doesnt find a way to better appeal to young women, they run the risk of missing out on a key group in a general election thats sure to be decided on razor-thin margins. But Republicans have conflicting opinions about what might bring that bloc over to the GOP.

It would be the perfect time to come up with a cohesive plan to speak to women, clearly has not happened, says Jennifer Lim, the founder and executive director of Republican Women for Progress.

Why the disenchantment with the GOP? No surprises here: experts say that the recent shift likely has everything to do with abortion. After all, 71 percent of young women say that abortion should be legal in most or all cases.

Young women did have a big increase in voting Democratic even though they normally are more Democratic, says William Frey, a senior fellow with Brookings Metro who analyzed exit polls from the 2022 midterm. I think you can chalk that up, to some degree, to the abortion issue.

The huge turnout we saw this past midterm is a direct result of the rollback of freedoms related directly to abortion, says Jessica Herrera, the communications and marketing director for Supermajority, a left-leaning organization that aims to up womens participation in elections.

So how does the GOP hope to remedy this ideological divide before November 2024? Conservative CNN commentator Alice Stewart thinks that Republicans need to change how they talk about abortion, without necessarily changing their policies.

I fought really hard for overturning Roe v. Wade, and Im extremely pro-life and unapologetically pro-life, Stewart tells Women Rule.

I also acknowledged that it has been a double-edged sword because that issue has motivated pro-abortion voters. This obviously is an issue that is important for younger voters, women voters, and we need to make sure that they understand that abortion isnt the only option.

Rep. Kat Cammack (R-FL), one of the youngest women in Congress, echoed that sentiment. As she sees it, the GOP needs to make sure that pregnant women have support systems in place so they dont need an abortion in the first place.

Being pro-life is not just being pro-life in the womb. Its being pro-life after the fact, says Cammack, who serves as the Bipartisan Congressional Pro-Life Caucus co-chair.

All too often, she says, some political personalities oversimplify the issue.

Theres so many times women feel like they dont have options or resources. So youve really seen in the last several years, a significant push for additional resources for crisis pregnancy centers really looking to support adoption and fostering initiatives. (Crisis pregnancy centers have become something of a rallying point for Democrats, who argue theyre often misleading about their mission.)

Cammack also notes young women are not a monolith and that they care about a plurality of issues outside of abortion. For the longest time, the GOP has treated women like single issue voters, she says.

Karoline Leavitt, who became the first Republican Gen Z congressional nominee during her unsuccessful 2022 bid to unseat Rep. Chris Pappas (D-N.H.), agrees that the GOP needs to lean into a variety of other issues that she believes will motivate young women.

She names crime and economic issues as two hard hitters. Women want good paying jobs, too. We dont want to be unable to afford our groceries or our gas bills. We want safety in our communities.

Eileen Sobjack, president of the National Federation of Republican Women, tells Women Rule she thinks the key might be in getting more young women into positions of power in the GOP which she hopes will encourage other young women to join the party.

We need more women of all ages. We need that perspective. Sobjack said. We need more of them running and in Congress and in the Senate.

In addition to not having any women represented in the field besides Nikki Haley, [the GOP] is still not addressing any issues women are dealing with, says Lim of Republican Women for Progress.

So if youre a younger woman, and youre watching this presidential election, theres still nothing to attract you to the Republican Party.

But even pushing for more women in politics is controversial among the partys most conservative faction. At Turning Point USAs annual Young Womens Leadership Summit in June, conservative podcast host Alex Clark, who is a woman herself, said that politics should not be a priority right now for conservative women. Women, she said, would be happier if they would go back to biblical roots and what God had designed for women to do.

Clarence Thomas, Ketanji Brown Jackson air sharp disagreement on race in America, by Josh Gerstein for POLITICO: Jacksons 28-page dissent defended the use of race-conscious programs to ameliorate the pervasive, present-day effects of Americas history of state-sponsored racism.

New York Dems put abortion on the ballot in bid to retake the House, by Brittany Gibson for POLITICO: Left-leaning New York groups pledged $20 million Thursday to support a change to the New York State constitution to protect abortion rights that will be on the 2024 ballot something they believe will boost turnout for Democrats in key swing House districts..

Harris on the hot seat: Veep has critical stretch ahead as campaign heats up, by Eugene Daniels for POLITICO.

Michelle Obama speaks about how affirmative action personally affected her college life, by Lucy Hodgman for POLITICO.

Read more here.

David Zalubowski/AP Photo

Migrant women find work building New York, their adopted city, by Stefanos Chen and Ana Ley for the New York Times: Attracted by the prospect of steadier work and better pay, more migrant women are entering the male-dominated construction industry, social service providers said, at a time when the city is struggling to accommodate tens of thousands of asylum seekers.

Women Interviewing for Bill Gatess Private Office Were Asked Sexually Explicit Questions, by Khadeeja Safdar and Emily Glazer for the Wall Street Journal.

The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act is a game changer for U.S. women. Heres why, by Megan Cerullo for CBS News: Starting Tuesday, millions of U.S. workers will gain vastly expanded protections under a new law that bars employers from discriminating against pregnant women and requires companies to provide accommodations so they can keep doing their jobs while theyre expecting.

Women in Leadership Face Ageism at Every Age, by Amy Diehl, Leanne M. Dzubinski, and Amber L. Stephenson for Harvard Business Review.

Read more here.

Marta Hansen is now a national program manager at Power the Polls. She most recently ran national partnerships for Power the Polls and was Assistant Dean of the Womens Community Center at Stanford University.

Cecilia Rouse will be president of Brookings. She currently is a Katzman-Ernst professor in economics and education at Princeton University and is a Biden White House alum.

Karla McKanders is joining the Thurgood Marshall Institute as director. She previously was a professor for critical race theory and immigration law at Vanderbilt University Law School.

Kelley Hudak is now director of federal relations at the American Petroleum Institute. She most recently was director of government affairs at Tyson Foods and is a Steve Scalise alum (h/t Playbook.)

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Republicans have a young woman problem - POLITICO - POLITICO

By Isabel Vander Stoep / isabel@chronline.com

The Lewis County Republican Party on Monday voted unanimously to cut ties with and vehemently denounce district 2 county Commissioner Lindsey Pollock, who was elected as a Republican in 2020.

Party Chairman Brandon Svenson said more than 30 people participated in the vote on whether or not to censure Pollock at the partys meeting on Monday. According to the U.S. Senate, the decision to censure a politician, while not as severe as expulsion, signals denouncement or condemnation.

The vote, according to a news release from Wednesday, means the party will not support Pollock if she runs for re-election. It came after a string of events spurred by a Lewis County Pride event in downtown Centralia on June 10, where a group of self-proclaimed white supremacists came and harassed event attendees.

The same day, party leaders set up a booth in downtown Chehalis, not far from where McFilers Chehalis Theater was hosting a drag show.

Lewis County Republican Party officials insist they have no connection with the white supremacist group. Pollock made a statement in a county meeting a few days later, drawing comparisons between the two groups behaviors and said both were set out to intimidate a minority group.

Svenson said the partys booth was meant to get signatures for an initiative to overturn a recently-passed Senate bill that creates confidentiality between shelters and transgender children leaving home to seek gender-affirming care the legislation has been heavily criticized for taking away parents rights.

Pollock later said she supported the initiative, too, but reprimanded the partys venue choice and one members decision to take photos of drag show attendees.

In public comment at a county meeting the following week, while demanding an apology from Pollock, party leaders suggested it was inappropriate that kids ages 13 and older, if accompanied by an adult, were allowed in the drag show.

During that meeting, Svenson asked Pollock to attend the July 3 meeting for discussion with the party. She told The Chronicle she was unable to attend due to previous obligations for an Independence Day celebration.

The Lewis County Republicans news release stated the vote to censure her came from her use of extremist language to describe the Republican Party and its leadership. This language is not reflective of the values and principles that our party stands for.

Though she was elected as a Republican, the news release claims Pollock has consistently failed to uphold our party's principles, values and the will of our constituents in Lewis County. Pollock has proven time and again that her beliefs and actions are incongruent with the true spirit of our party.

In an emailed response on Wednesday morning, Pollock wrote in part: I do not believe the opinion of a small group of extremists is representative of the fair-mindedness of the majority of Republicans nor the vast majority of voters in Lewis County.

For future county, district and statewide elections, Pollock said, the future of the Republican Party hinges on rejecting extremism on both ends of the scale.

One year ago, the county Republican party faced turmoil within the walls of its meetings, where some wanted to remove Svenson from the position of chairman. A few years ago, he held a sign at a county meeting, presumably aimed at Pollock, which read RINO, or Republican in Name-Only.

Since, though, the county saw a record number of Precinct Committee Officer elections. Meant to serve as community liaisons for the party, the officers also make up the committee which votes on matters such as Mondays censure.

We can unite and prosper, or divide and fail, Pollock wrote. The choice stands before us. As for me, I shall continue working to build a prosperous future for Lewis County.

On the other hand, the party likewise doubled down.

The news release called Pollocks speech a betrayal, later stating: Our commitment remains unwaveringly dedicated to promoting and electing genuine Republicans who will truly represent our morals, platform, values, and the interests of the people of Lewis County.

Editors note: The Chronicle erroneously printed that the Lewis County Pride event was on June 8 in a previous story.

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Lewis County Republicans Vote to Cut Ties With Commissioner ... - Centralia Chronicle

Schumer acknowledged he was rushing to lock in the project before the 2024 elections. With this money in hand, Schumer said, even if Democrats lose control of the Senate and Donald Trump or another Republican hostile to the project becomes president, the money cannot easily be taken back and the $17 billion tunnel project will survive. To rescind federal grant money would require a supermajority in Congress, something that Schumer said will not happen.

During the Trump administration, the president suggested he might support the project if Schumer would help him build a wall across the Mexican border an obvious no-go for Democrats at the time. Now, though, there are some signs that Republicans have moved on from trying to kill the project and instead are focused on containing its costs. Still, supporters of the tunnels on both sides of the Hudson are breathing a sigh of relief after months of anxiety about when the money would come.

Already, there are some cost overruns, though Schumer and others have blamed them on delays during Trumps time in office.

New York and New Jersey may have to pony up several billion dollars apiece to build the project, though officials are trying to get more federal money to lower each states share of the projects total costs. Construction on the tunnels themselves will begin next summer, though some needed construction along the shores of the Hudson River is happening this year.

Schumer has nurtured the project for years, along with some New Jersey officials like Sen. Bob Menendez, a fellow Democrat. Together, they brought the tunnel project back to life after New Jersey Republican Gov. Chris Christie killed off a prior version of it a decade ago.

President Joe Biden, widely known for his love and use of trains, is a major supporter of the Gateway suite of projects and money for the tunnels comes from a bipartisan infrastructure law.

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul called Schumer on Thursday to congratulate him about the money. New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy, who also supports the project, said in a statement that the money marked a pivotal benchmark.

According to the bi-state Gateway Development Commission, which is overseeing the project, the $6.88 billion will come in the form of Federal Transit Administration capital investment grants. The commission also expects to receive about $4 billion from other federal grants.

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$7 billion for Hudson River tunnels locks in project beyond ... - POLITICO

The U.S. attorney in Delaware denied retaliating against an I.R.S. official who had disclosed details of the Hunter Biden investigation, and denied being blocked from pursuing serious charges against Mr. Biden, the presidents son, in Los Angeles and Washington.

David C. Weiss, an appointee of former President Donald J. Trump held over by the Biden administration, defended the integrity of his investigation in a two-page letter sent to House Republicans late Friday, in which he provided the most detailed explanation yet of the five-year probe that culminated in a plea agreement last month that would rule out prison time for Mr. Biden, who was facing misdemeanor tax charges and a separate gun charge.

The Department of Justice did not retaliate against Gary Shapley, who claims Mr. Weiss helped block a promotion he had sought after reaching out to congressional investigators, Mr. Weiss wrote in the letter to Representative Jim Jordan of Ohio, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee.

Mr. Weiss went on to address, in hypothetical terms, the core of Mr. Shapleys allegations: that Biden-appointed U.S. attorneys in California and Washington had blocked Mr. Weiss from prosecuting Hunter Biden on felony tax charges during a period when the presidents youngest son was earning millions representing foreign-controlled businesses.

Mr. Shapley, testifying before the House Ways and Means Committee in May under what Republicans said were whistle-blower protections, also said he and other investigators had witnessed Mr. Weiss saying last year that he would not be the deciding official regarding whether to prosecute Mr. Biden, and that Mr. Weiss had been turned down when he sought special counsel status after being told by local prosecutors that he could not bring charges. House Republicans released the testimony last month.

While Mr. Weiss did not deny that those offices had turned down his request to bring the more serious charges, he backed up Attorney General Merrick B. Garlands public statement that he had been given full authority in the case, and that he had the option of overruling prosecutors by simply reaching out to Mr. Garland or his top aides.

As the U.S. attorney in Delaware, my charging authority is geographically limited to my home district, wrote Mr. Weiss.

If venue for a case lies elsewhere, common departmental practice is to contact the United States Attorneys Office for the district in question and determine whether it wants to partner on the case, he added. If not, I may request special attorney status.

Deputizing a federal prosecutor as a special attorney is distinct from making them a special counsel. The special attorney provision is, in essence, a workaround that allows an outsider to intervene in cases that span multiple jurisdictions or have special conditions. The special counsel regulations, by contrast, contain internal Justice Department reporting requirements and congressional oversight provisions.

Mr. Garland has said Mr. Weiss never asked him to be named special counsel.

Mr. Weiss did not address those issues explicitly in the letter he sent to Mr. Jordan on Friday. But he said that if he wanted to bring charges against Mr. Biden in California or Washington, he would do so without concern about being blocked by the departments leadership.

I have been assured that, if necessary after the above process, I would be granted 515 Authority in the District of Columbia, the Central District of California, or any other district where charges could be brought in this matter, he wrote, referring to the section of federal law that defines the role of a special attorney.

The letter follows a June 7 missive he sent to committee Republicans making many of the same points in less specific terms.

Mr. Weiss has been deeply frustrated by what he believes to be unwarranted attacks on his character and motives, and was eager to air his response to Mr. Shapleys allegations before the July 4 break, according to two people familiar with the situation.

An email sent to Mr. Weisss spokeswoman was not answered immediately.

Mr. Jordan, along with Representative James R. Comer of Kentucky, who leads the Oversight Committee, and Representative Jason Smith of Missouri, who heads the Ways and Means Committee, sent letters on Thursday to Mr. Weiss and other officials involved in the Hunter Biden investigation requesting their testimony on the matter.

Mr. Weiss said the Justice Departments legislative affairs office was reaching out to Mr. Jordans staff to discuss appropriate timeline and scope for his public testimony once it was appropriate to do so.

In his statement announcing Mr. Bidens plea agreement, Mr. Weiss said the investigation was ongoing, which legally precludes him from testifying about the details.

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U.S. Attorney in Hunter Biden Case Defends Investigation to House ... - The New York Times