Victoria Spartz says Ukraine should consider giving up land, slams Zelensky at town halls

Despite being told to not attend town halls amid protests, Rep. Victoria Spartz (R-IN) did not take a break last weekend. Instead, the Ukrainian-born Indiana congresswoman showed up and took tough questions from voters, some of whom were angry at her over her support for Trump and comments on Ukraine. She held another town hall the next day. 

Spartz, the only member of Congress born in the embattled country, did not hold back in a recent interview with The Telegraph before the town halls, she said Ukraine might have to accept losing territory to Russia if it wants to avoid total collapse.

"I just don’t see how they (Ukraine) can be positioned to demand to keep the land. If they would be winning the war, that will be very different,” Spartz said. She backed Trump’s idea of negotiating with Russian President Vladimir Putin and criticized Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, saying, “There are no easy solutions.”

"President Trump inherited it, so now he has to deal with that,” she said, blaming President Joe Biden for not doing enough to help Ukraine earlier in the war. “As I said two years ago, the best thing is to win wars as fast as you can. As long as it takes usually doesn’t end very well for Democracies,” she added.

Spartz hasn’t held back from criticizing Zelensky in the past. After Zelensky and Trump clashed during a White House meeting, she said Zelensky had done a “disservice to the Ukrainian people” and "insulting the American president.”

"They will have election, and then if they elect him, they’re going to lose the rest of the country,” she warned.

Spartz was one of the early supporters of US help for Ukraine. But last year she voted against a $61 billion aid package, saying Ukraine’s government was corrupt and the US shouldn’t give “blank cheques.”

At a town hall last month, some people asked why she wasn’t backing Ukraine more. She said, “My number one job as an American congresswoman is to protect interests, American interests.”

Even though she lived in Ukraine for the first 22 years of her life, she says she will put America first. “Everyone that comes across the ocean is an America first,” she said. During the interview, she called Ukrainians “them,” not “us.”

Spartz moved to the U.S. in 2000 and later became a citizen. She worked as an accountant and was chief financial officer for Indiana’s attorney general’s office before joining the Indiana Senate in 2017. She won a seat in Congress in 2021. Last year, Spartz was investigated by the House ethics committee after staff claimed she “abused” them. One claimed she called them an “effing retard.” Spartz denied the claim and the investigation was dropped.

She also made headlines after she was caught with a .380 pistol in her carry-on bag at Dulles International Airport. Her office said it was a mistake and the gun wasn’t loaded.

Before politics, Spartz worked in commercial real estate. She says that helped her understand tough negotiations. “Everybody’s trying to screw you, and if you’re not good at negotiating, you will be screwed quickly,” she said. She says she does not trust Putin, even if she agrees with Trump’s plans for talks: “You can never trust Putin, the only way you can enforce peace with Putin is having the power to be able to win wars, period."

Spartz was born in Nosiva, a village in northern Ukraine. She visited Ukraine in April 2022 and saw her grandmother’s home damaged by Russian bombs.

“When you see that with your own eyes, it’s almost surreal that we are living through this in the 21st century,” she told Vanity Fair.

As Trump talks about pushing for peace, Spartz says it’s still wise to prepare for the worst. “Everybody needs to be ready to have another war,” she said. “But if we’re ready for the war, we might be able to have peace.”