President Donald Trump may have left Washington, but his pro-Russia views persist in at least part of the Republican Party.

On Monday, Democratic Rep. Tom Malinowski’s New Jersey office began fielding phone calls from constituents who argued that Russia is only seeking peace by massing forces on the Ukrainian border and that America should stay out of the conflict. Several callers mentioned Fox host Tucker Carlson, who has suggested that the United States should be supporting Moscow instead of Kyiv.

“My district director told me she’d talked to four people in the last hour who called in about this, and there were other calls. The phone was ringing while she was on the phone with those people,” said Malinowski, who served as the assistant secretary of State for democracy, human rights, and labor in the Obama administration. “I’ve been aware that this has been Tucker Carlson’s obsession for the last few weeks, but it was the first time I had seen my own constituents parroting his words back to me.”

The calls demonstrate a split in how the Republican party is responding to Russia’s military buildup along Ukraine’s border. While many Republicans on Capitol Hill are criticizing Biden for being too weak on Russian leader Vladimir Putin, far-right members of the party are painting Russia as the victim and lambasting Bidenfor provoking Moscow. This evokes similar rhetoric to Trump, who has publicly sided with Putin over the U.S. government and said that he and the Russian leader get along.

For more moderate members of the GOP, it’s “uncomfortable” to address these pro-Russia views that are lingering after Trump is out of office, Malinowski said.

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