Welcome to the dispatch podcast.

I'm Steve Hayes here with senior writer David French and US Senator Rob Portman, Republican

from Ohio.

We're happy to have Senator Portman here today to talk about Ukraine and issue he's been

involved in four years, the Electoral Count Act, and we'll probably get to a little bit

of his Cincinnati Bengals and the Super Bowl as well.

Senator Portman, thanks for joining us on the dispatch podcast.

I want to jump right in and ask you about what's happening right now in Ukraine.

You recently went over, you had a series of high-level meetings, presumably heard, got

the sense of the leaders of the Ukrainian government firsthand.

I want you to explain to our listeners what is happening on the ground there, what is

Vladimir Putin doing, and there's been a noticeable difference in the way that the Ukrainian

government leadership has responded to it and talked about it and the US government,

particularly the Biden administration.

I'd love to get your thoughts on that.

Well, first, thanks for having me on, Steve.

It's great to be with you guys and congratulations on your successes with the dispatch.

What's going on today is sort of a replay of what went on almost 80 years ago.

In this case, the authoritarian large country saying we'd like to swallow up a smaller

democratic country and it's extraordinary that this is happening in the 21st century.

The outrage that so many free countries feel, luckily, is being channeled into something

constructive, which is providing more arms and military assistance generally to Ukraine,

...