As Ukraine continues to fight to protect its country and democracy after an unjustified and unprovoked invasion by Russia, editorial boards are calling him out for injecting politics into this crisis, saying he has “plenty of criticism, but few solutions.” The Salisbury Post in Budd’s home district is sending him a clear message: “There’s more to do than practice partisanship.”

In recent days, Budd has sided with Trump’s comments praising Putin and called Putin “very intelligent.”

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Salisbury Post: Editorial: Avoid partisanship, embrace common solutions around Ukraine invasion

• To hear Rowan County’s congressman, Rep. Ted Budd, tell it, President Joe Biden may be solely responsible for the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

• Budd trotted out thick partisan rhetoric by laying blame for decisions of a deranged dictator, Vladimir Putin, at the feet of a single U.S. president. Are there ways Biden fell short of holding Russia’s feet to the fire before things reached a crisis point? Certainly. As the elected leader of the United States of America, the country with the largest economy and best-funded military, he has a bigger role than most elected heads of state. But there are no straight lines between individual actions by the United States and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

• Budd can have a far more substantial role in punishing Putin for an inexcusable invasion of a sovereign country through his role on the Financial Services Committee than by making statements comparing records of U.S. presidents or praising Putin.

• He’ll need some help from the other side to do that, but his current strategy hasn’t gone over well with his own side either. Republican U.S. Senate opponent Gov. Pat McCrory called Budd out for praising Putin and calling him “intelligent.” It’s unfathomable that Budd, who wants to be a U.S. senator, would call Putin intelligent as the dictator’s military is dropping bombs on women and children, McCrory said.

• As it has already proven, the invasion of Ukraine can a galvanize new, unified and nonpartisan responses toward global peace. A crowd of a couple hundred at a downtown prayer vigil Monday should raise possibilities about other ways the Salisbury-Rowan community can help. 

• In our community there are people from Ukraine and others with experience helping service organizations in the country, participating in religious exchanges and adopted children who made Salisbury home (stories the Post is working to tell).

• There’s more to do than practice partisanship.

News & Observer: ​​NCGOP blames Biden’s ‘weak’ response to Russia, but can’t say what ‘strong’ would be

• With the situation escalating, Republicans have been quick to cast blame on Biden, whose presidency, they say, has been characterized by weak leadership and countless policy failures. They’ve even suggested that the Biden administration’s weakness is what empowered Russia to invade Ukraine in the first place. 

• Just don’t ask them what they think the president should be doing instead, because they don’t seem to have an answer. Republicans have offered little to no description of what being “strong” against Russia would look like. Some have said the sanctions levied on Russia by the U.S. so far haven’t gone far enough. Others seem to think the U.S. shouldn’t get involved at all. Still others, like U.S. Rep. Ted Budd, have taken on a more Trumpian tone.

• Budd, the Trump-endorsed candidate running for North Carolina’s open U.S. Senate seat in 2022, seemed to take a page out of the former president’s playbook when he told CBS 17 that Russian leader Vladimir Putin is “evil” but also “very intelligent.” 

• How Republicans think the U.S. should approach the biggest land war in Europe since World War II seems to amount to little more than “not the way Joe Biden is handling it.” Like so much else, from Obamacare to COVID to Afghanistan to inflation, the GOP has plenty of criticism, but few solutions.

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