No Flowers for Ukrainian Women on International Women's Day

Floor Speech

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Ms. KAPTUR. Madam Speaker, I want to thank Congresswoman Jackie Speier of California for her leadership on so many issues, including women. Not just women but for people everywhere, in our country, those who have been abused, those who serve in our military, and those who serve in our intelligence services. I thank her for her great contributions to our country, how she has lived her life and has served so nobly. The people of California have really sent a jewel here, and they know it. I shall miss her greatly when she makes her decision to leave us at the end of this session of Congress. She is truly a friend and a friend to the American people.

I am very honored this evening to join her and rise on this International Women's Day to call out the damaged and really bestial soul of Vladimir Putin. His torturous treatment of the women, children, and elderly of Ukraine is a war crime.

He is about genocide in a country that 30 years ago voted to be independent. When the Soviet Union fell, 90 percent of the people of Ukraine, about 42 million people, voted that they wanted to be free. It was an extraordinary moment in world history.

But yet, we hear from this--what do I call him--Russia's tyrant--last year on International Women's Day, he issued a statement. Here is what he said: Congratulations to women--calling the day a ``holiday filled with joy, warmth and goodness.'' And he talked about mothers, granddaughters, grandmothers, aunts, sisters, saying how they represented love and tenderness and how good this was. Yet, if we look at the pictures that are here, he is killing them.

There are pictures of the people. Look at this woman. He says tenderness and love and that women are taking care of countries and they are raising children. He is killing them.

The elderly and the disabled--I received a letter today, and two individuals were killed in a car because a Russian bomb came down in a civilian area. The woman who was driving was elderly, and the person she had in the car with her was disabled. He is massacring civilians. He says he loves women. Really? They are dead. They didn't have a chance. They are civilians.

In terms of the disruption of life in Ukraine, God bless them. Over 2 million have now fled from their tiny, little homes. It is one of the poorest Nations in Europe, but it wants its freedom.

Here is a picture of the numbers of people fleeing. You can see, if you look at the number of headscarves, these are women with their children. Many at the Ukraine-Poland border are kissing their husbands goodbye, they fear for the last time. The children are crying.

In the westernmost city of Ukraine, Lviv, there is a sea of displaced people. Europe has not seen this since the Second World War, nothing like it. Free people everywhere have to pay attention. These are good people.

Seventy-five percent of the food raised in that country that is eaten by the people there is raised by those women in their family plots, in their gardens. Putin is killing them. He is killing the mothers and grandmothers of Ukraine.

What do his statements matter in the Kremlin, when he comes out of his cave, wherever that is. We see the butchery on the news every night. We see it on our iPhones. Our visceral feelings of horror pale in comparison to the lived reality of those who now know deep fear, anxiety, and loss.

The reality is that Putin is sending his troops in those tanks and those jets up in the air to shoot and bomb hospitals and maternity wards and kindergartens and schools. He has already killed, from 2014 to the present, when he first invaded Ukraine, 14,000 people who aren't known to the world, and now more. He has no heart.

In his statement last year, on International Women's Day, he said: Thank you to the women doctors, the paramedics, the medical nurses, and all of those who are saving lives and nursing patients back to health. What a lie.

These women in Ukraine today, without proper bandages, without medical equipment, are caring for women who are pregnant and delivering in the subway systems of the capital city, in Kyiv. If they need a C- section and they are cut, there is no thread to sew them up. How about that, Putin? How about that?

How many children have you killed since your invasion of Ukraine? The misery among these people.

This abominable creature is now spilling the blood of those he once heralded. Ukraine's medical professionals and their patients are being murdered. The people trying to help are being murdered.

On a day Putin recently proclaimed as the triumph of love and admiration and gratitude. This two-faced liar is committing war crimes against an innocent people.

Can Putin be human? A human could not celebrate women on one day and then annihilate them and their families on the next. He simply couldn't be human. He is a killer of Lucifer proportion. He considers human life not sacred.

So on this International Women's Day, a day dedicated to honoring women around the globe, let us recognize the brave, courageous women of Ukraine.

From every walk of life, they have endured centuries of oppression. Now, with this window on liberty, this moment in history, they have a chance to take their young democracy forward, and they are fighting for it.

They are sewing camouflage material to try to prevent the planes from seeing where they live. They are defending their homeland with every ounce left in them. There is not enough food, and there is not enough water.

As co-chair of the Congressional Ukraine Caucus and as someone who has visited Ukraine since the 1970s countless times, I know these women and their bravery. There is nothing you can teach a grandma in Ukraine that she hasn't been through. We call them babusyas. They are the world's strongest women. They have endured so much. Ukraine's women are truly engaged in a battle to slay Goliath.

Ukraine's passionate, generous, and courageous women are on the front lines. There are some who are serving in the military itself, on the home front, in their neighborhoods.

I don't know if anybody saw the babusya, a grandma, who had a pan, and she hit an armed drone out of the air. How about that? They are learning how to use guns, to do anything to help their people in beating the savage attacks of Kremlin's Putin.

The entire world sees the bold spirit of these women. Here in America, we see that spirit in Ukraine's remarkable Ambassador Oksana Markarova, who has such dignity, dignity under pressure, real courage, rallying our Nation and our leaders for the aid of her country. We must hear her. We must hear the pleas of the people of Ukraine.

In the midst of unceasing atrocity, Ukraine's women are pouring their hearts and souls into the righteous cause of defending the bright shining light of liberty. They can see it.

I will tell you one experience I had when I first went to Ukraine, and I watched how the people walked with their heads down, and they didn't want to be noticed. They tried to be almost disappeared while they were walking down the sidewalk. They didn't want to make eye contact with anybody.

Today, when you go to Ukraine, the new generation, they look at you, they have hope in their eyes, there is possibility. They want to access West. There is no more noble duty than defending liberty and letting others enjoy its bounty.

When envisioning the vanguards of democracy, don't think of some mythical beings. Instead, think of the flesh and blood of Ukrainian women who are protecting and defending the precious blessings of the bit of democracy and liberty that they have been able to taste. These women are the real heroines among us.

Today, America and the world rise up in solidarity with Ukraine's women. Let us salute their valiant fight against the darkness and the murderous behavior of Vladimir Putin. We stand with them, and we stand with Ukraine. No country in the world has done more for Ukraine than the people of our great country.

Today, on International Women's Day in the year of 2022, America exclaims to Ukraine's women: Slava Ukraini. Thank you, we love you, we know you are going to be victorious. It is going to take a bit more time, but know that we in the free world stand with you and are doing everything possible to save you, to save your beloved families, to save your communities, to save your country. You so deserve the liberty that you have earned.

I say in many of my speeches back home, there is no more sacred soil than the soil of Ukraine because of what its people intergenerationally have endured through no fault of their own. They deserve to be free. They have earned it.

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