Get the latest Syracuse news delivered right to your inbox.
Subscribe to our newsletter here.

When Anna Meehan walked into the first meeting of Syracuse University’s Ukrainian Student Association since election night, she expected the room to be filled with discussion surrounding Donald Trump’s victory.

The meeting was surprisingly quiet, Meehan said, as his victory hit even closer to home for Ukrainian students on-campus.

“I know it’s like a lot of people on campus were kind of just quiet and shocked about it and unsure how to react, and I think that was similar among our club members,” Meehan, the association’s president, said.

Trump’s stance on the Russia-Ukraine war has fluctuated. The president-elect has repeatedly threatened to pull military aid from Ukraine, though Russian President Vladimir Putin recently said he would be willing to enter into ceasefire conversations with Trump.

Tuesday marked the 1,000th day since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. Republicans, who claimed widespread victory in Congressional races, are mainly in support of Trump’s proposed policies regarding the war in Ukraine. According to a July 2024 report from Pew Research Center, 62% of Republican voters say the U.S. does not have a responsibility to help Ukraine defend itself from Russia’s invasion.

The Ukrainian Student Association is now planning initiatives to bring SU’s Ukrainian community together by advocating for the United States to continue providing military support. Meehan said the association hopes to draft letters to Republican representatives explaining why they believe supporting Ukraine should be a bipartisan priority.

Meehan said the organization’s members bring a range of political perspectives, and not everyone agreed on which presidential candidate was best for Ukraine’s interests. Ukrainian citizens living abroad had different reactions from American students, as they themselves couldn’t vote in the election, she said.

“I think there’s a lot of apprehension, a lot of different opinions, which is really surprising to me,” Meehan said. “I definitely thought people would be … very scared about the future, but that’s not necessarily the case.”

Meehan said some of the members, especially Ukrainian citizens, aren’t as concerned with U.S. politics, primarily worrying about when the war will end and what a peaceful solution will look like.

Dariya Getya, a recent SU graduate who’s still involved with the Ukrainian Student Association, said she and many others are unsure how a Trump administration will affect Ukraine. Throughout the war, she said her family that lives in Belbek, a town in Crimea, has seen heavy fighting firsthand.

“The most common feeling that everyone experiences is the frustration and uncertainty, because no one can actually say what exactly will happen, but everyone has a lot of fears and concerns,” Getya said.

Getya also said the association provides an outlet to talk about the ongoing war with people who have similar feelings and experiences. While there is uncertainty, she said the association gives her an outlet to voice her fears and a community that supports each other.

Courtesy of the Ukrainian Student Association

Tuesday marked the 1,000th day since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. The association is now planning initiatives to bring SU’s Ukrainian community together by advocating for the United States to continue providing military support.

Kateryna Kolesova, an SU master’s student and member of the association, is also part of United for Ukraine, a government program that allows her to temporarily remain in the U.S. without a student visa. She said that, while she hopes to go back to her hometown in northwest Ukraine to visit her grandmother and friends, she’s happy she found a community at SU.

Kolesova said she talks to her grandmother regularly but, over this past weekend, she couldn’t reach her over the past weekend due to a Russian air strike that cut the power in her area, which is about three and a half hours from Kyiv.

“We all support Ukraine and just try to make more people aware of culture, of our situation and maybe help people be more involved. Show them how they can help. Show them what being Ukrainian is,” Kolesova said.

The letters project stemmed from social media posts other Ukrainian Student Association chapters at several universities have made. Many chapters have posted their email drafts to representatives so other students can use them as templates.

Meehan said that for the past two years, the Ukraine Student Association has been working under an American government that is very pro-Ukraine. Now, the Ukrainian community is now moving into “unprecedented territory,” she said, with new leaders across the government.

In addition to bringing students of Ukrainian heritage together, the letters also encourage students to take action and have their voices heard, Meehan said. Many students have expressed feeling uncertain and unable to help, so writing letters can serve as a direct form of political advocacy that everyone can participate in.

Next semester, Meehan said she also intends to plan a 30-day review — an accelerated version of an 100-day-review — of Trump’s candidacy, where the association will invite political science professors at SU to assess Trump’s actions within the first month of his term and how they impact Ukraine.

“I’ve been sort of enlightened, I guess, by seeing people from all different perspectives still have hope, which is good, because, I mean, you kind of need to have hope,” Meehan said. “If you don’t then that’s when people start to go silent and start forgetting the issue.”

Published on November 21, 2024 at 2:40 am

Contact Kate: kjacks19@syr.edu