WASHINGTON — Congressional representative Dr. Raul Ruiz says he understands the plight of refugees.

The U.S. Army honored him for his relief work in Haiti after the devastating earthquake in 2010.

Ruiz also grew up in, and represents, California’s Coachella Valley, which has long attracted asylum seekers fleeing violent and dangerous countries in Latin America.

“It’s an experience of life or death where people are fleeing for their lives,” Ruiz said.

Sunday, when he spoke to Spectrum News, it was after 10 p.m. in Poland. Ruiz and other members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee were at the Ukraine-Poland border to assess the humanitarian crisis there.

More than a million Ukrainians have crossed that border in the last two weeks seeking refuge from the war in their homeland.

“I’ve seen things here that I’ve never seen anywhere after a humanitarian crisis like this,” Ruiz said. “I was imagining to see these large humanitarian refugee camps but instead the Polish people have welcomed them and many have taken them into their homes.”

The congressman described how refugees are met at the Poland border.

“As soon as they’re triaged, they have the option to take the bus to relatives’ homes in other countries, or they go into a welcome center that acts as a shelter, where there’s medical care food and supplies.”

After meeting with Polish officials, U.S. disaster response teams and Ukrainian activists, Ruiz discovered there are many Ukrainians still left behind; including the elderly, the disabled and sick children, and those who couldn’t afford a train ticket to the border.

Their lives are in jeopardy as Russia attacks civilian areas of Ukraine, including — according to Ukrainian officials — humanitarian corridors.

“It is very important that there is security for international humanitarian organizations,” Ruiz said. “The U.S. is committed to supporting the Ukrainians with the resources they need to secure their skies, and their hospitals to secure their vulnerable populations as called by the international humanitarian law, so that humanitarian workers can go in and provide the care that the non-combative civilians need.”

On Monday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said President Joe Biden pledged an additional $350 million for defense support to Ukraine, 70% of that has already been spent.

Biden has also granted temporary protective status to the tens of thousand of Ukrainians already in the U.S.

Ruiz believes the U.S. will soon need to open its doors to refugees as well.

“It’s important that the U.S. continues to work with our NATO allies in order to develop and be prepared to moved refugees to different locations with shared responsibility to minimize the causalities and hardships,” said Ruiz.

Ukrainians have proven to be courageous and unyielding in their fight for democracy, inspiring Ruiz to hold on to hope for a diplomatic solution.

Congressional leaders reached a bipartisan deal early Wednesday, providing $13.6 billion to help Ukraine and European allies plus billions more to battle the pandemic as part of an overdue $1.5 trillion measure financing federal agencies for the rest of this year.

Though a tiny fraction of the massive bill, the money countering a Russian blitzkrieg that’s devastated parts of Ukraine and prompted Europe’s worst refugee crisis since World War II, ensured the measure would pass with robust bipartisan support.

Biden requested $10 billion for military, humanitarian and economic aid last week, and Democratic and Republican backing was so staunch that the figure grew to $12 billion on Monday and $13.6 billion just a day later.

“We’re going to support them against tyranny, oppression, violent acts of subjugation,” Biden said at the White House.

Party leaders planned to whip the 2,741-page measure through the House on Wednesday and the Senate by week’s end, though that chamber’s exact timing was unclear. Lawmakers were spurred by the urgency of helping Ukraine before Russia’s military might make it too late.

Over $4 billion of the Ukraine aid was to help the country and Eastern European nations cope with the two million refugees who’ve already fled the fighting. Another $6.7 billion was for the deployment of U.S. troops and equipment to the region and to transfer American military items to Ukraine and U.S. allies.

There was also economic aid and money to enforce economic sanctions against Russia.