WASHINGTON — Something about Vladimir Putin makes Republicans in the US presidential race see red. The Russian president has emerged as a symbol for what they view as President Barack Obama's weak foreign policy, and an easy route for criticizing his former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the Democrats' likely choice for the November 2016 election.
With his bare-chested swagger and wily geopolitical moves, Putin is an easy target, the man whose aggression against Ukraine and annexation of Crimea have revived Cold War tensions that Republicans credit their hero, President Ronald Reagan, with having ended in the 1980s.
“What Putin is trying to do is market the strongman concept,” Republican presidential candidate Lindsey Graham, a US senator from South Carolina, said. “He has a brand and his brand is to be in your face and say, ‘We're not going to be pushed around by the West.'”
No leader abroad draws more Republican criticism than Putin does. The candidates' message is clear: If any of them are elected president, US relations with Russia will turn even more negative.
“I think it will resonate with Republican voters,” said David Yepsen, director of the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute at Southern Illinois University. “There's real concern about what Putin is really up to.”
It helps them that the 62-year-old former KGB officer is deeply unpopular in the United States. A survey by the non-partisan Pew Research Center in February said Putin was viewed unfavorably by 70 percent of Americans.
Foreign policy does not always figure prominently in US presidential elections.
The quadrennial vote often hinges on the health of the US economy. Republicans this time have seized on the daily drumbeat of news around the world: Islamic State beheadings in the Middle East, Chinese claims to disputed waters, Russia flexing its muscles.
Given the turbulent state of affairs, Republicans believe the “Putin as boogeyman” theme serves well as a way to rally the party's base of supporters.
In Moscow, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Putin could take the heat so long as the criticism did not go “beyond the limits of what is reasonable, if it's not an insult.” — Reuters
