Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., voiced his displeasure on Newsmax over Sen. Lindsey Graham's recent comment that someone should "take out" Russian President Vladimir Putin to stop the invasion of Ukraine.
"I think that's a bridge too far," Marshall said on Friday's "Spicer & Co.'' "I was visiting with some Army leadership today, and they didn't bring it up. But I just asked myself does that help us do our job, help them do their job, or does it hurt them."
Graham, R-S.C., came under fire after his post on Twitter on Thursday, in which he seemingly called for someone to kill the Russian leader to end the bloodshed caused by Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
"Is there a 'Brutus' in Russia? Is there a more successful Colonel Stauffenberg in the Russian military," Graham's tweet Thursday said. "The only way this ends is for somebody in Russia to take this guy [Putin] out. You would be doing your country — and the world — a great service."
The tweet has led both Democrats and fellow Republicans to criticize Graham.
"That is not the position of the United States government and certainly not a statement you'd hear come from the mouth of anybody working in this administration," White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters Friday, according to The Washington Post.
Fellow Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, called the post "an exceptionally bad idea," adding that sanctions and boycotts of Russian oil and gas are solutions, along with military aid for the Ukrainians.
"But we should not be calling for the assassination of heads of state," Cruz said.
Marshall said that halting Russian oil and gas are much better options to stopping the invasion, cutting off the cash Putin needs to wage war.
"I think really, our focus should be right now, is to stop buying any oil or natural gas from Vladimir Putin," Marshall said. "That's how he's funding this war."
Marshall said the European Union should be leading efforts because it is so much closer to the situation in Ukraine, but that not buying oil and gas remains the most effective measures to end the war.
"[Fifty percent] of the economy in Russia is driven by oil and gas, by energy exports," he said. "We can shut off that war machine if Europe and [the] United States come together and stop importing any energy from Vladimir Putin."
The White House has been hesitant to impose such a sanction out of fear that it would lead to a global energy crisis and hurt the American people.
"What we know is that, you know, from the U.S. economy, we don't import a lot of Russian oil, but we are looking at options that we can take right now if we were to cut the U.S. consumption of Russian energy," the Post reported that Psaki said Friday. "But what's really most important is that we maintain a steady supply of global energy."
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