CPAC backtracks on tweet criticizing US aid to Ukraine

The Conservative Political Action Committee (CPAC) tweeted Saturday that its account delayed the deletion of an “unapproved” post on the Ukrainian crisis due to the time difference of an event its hosting in Sydney, Australia.

According to screenshots of the post shared on Twitter, CPAC had tweeted that Russian President Vladimir Putin “announces the annexation of 4 Ukrainian-occupied territories” while “Biden and the Dems continue to send Ukraine billions of taxpayer dollars.”

“Meanwhile, we are under attack at our southern border. When will Democrats put #AmericaFirst and end the gift-giving to Ukraine?” CPAC wrote in the original post.

The post went up Friday morning and was not taken down until sometime on Saturday.

CPAC said there was a delay in deleting the “unapproved tweet” because of a time difference, as the organization is currently hosting a conference in Australia. CPAC also acknowledged the post had “belittled the plight of the innocent Ukraine people.”

“Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine must be repelled. Putin is a madman that is putting millions of lives at risk with his loose talk of nuclear war,” the conservative organization wrote. “We must oppose Putin, but American taxpayers should not be shouldering the vast majority of the cost.”

The Hill has reached out to CPAC for additional comment.

Congress last week passed a stopgap funding bill that also gave another $12 billion in assistance to Ukraine in addition to$50 billion included in previous legislation.

Since January 2021, the Defense Department says they have committed $16.9 billion in security aid to Ukraine.

Ukraine, which is fighting off a Russian invasion launched in February, has thwarted Russian forces and pushed them back in massive counterattacks with the security assistance.

Russia has shown no signs of backing down, with Putin calling up some 300,000 reservists last month. On Friday, he made increased threats of nuclear war, which some officials said was a sign of Putin’s desperation in losing ground in Ukraine despite moving to annex part of southern and eastern Ukraine.

CPAC, one of the world’s largest conservative organizations, held a conference in August that invited former President Trump and far-right leader Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán as speakers.

Orbán has been criticized for having closer ties to Putin than other European leaders, while Trump has in the past refused to criticize the Russian leader, particularly after the intelligence community determined that Moscow interfered in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.