What they’re saying: “When we murder wantonly innocent civilians because of who they are, whether it be their religion, their race, their nationality — that is genocide. And Mr. Putin is guilty of it,” Schumer said.

Why it matters: No Western government, including the Biden administration, has gone as far as Schumer or Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in formally characterizing the reported massacre of hundreds of civilians in the Kyiv suburb as genocide.