(NewsNation) —  Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has been going on for nearly three months. The horror unfolding there strikes close to home for millions, but especially for one lawmaker in the U.S. capital.

Indiana Congresswoman Victoria Spartz is the first Ukrainian-born lawmaker serving in Congress.

She has spoken out about the situation, even making an emotional plea for stronger U.S. action, saying, “This is not a war. This is a genocide.”

Spartz, a Republican, has been pushing for Congress to quickly get more weapons and humanitarian aid to Ukraine.

“It’s definitely a difficult situation. I mean no one [in Ukraine] is really OK. But you know, they live — so it’s better than some other people,” Spartz said Wednesday on NewsNation’s “Rush Hour.”

The decision by Sweden and Finland to seek NATO membership beckons a larger conversation, Spartz believes.

“If you think about it, we created a situation, and it’s a broad discussion we need to have, if one child from (NATO member) Romania dies, we have the whole full military support of our whole part of the world and (the) best military is coming to help. But if the same child dies in (non-NATO) Moldova, or Finland, you know, we’re just going to say, ‘Well, too bad?’” Spartz said. “So I think it’s a very dangerous situation. We need to have a discussion how we can … have more world community involvement to deal with crisis.”

Spartz had the opportunity to visit her home country recently and said the situation is bad.

“It’s probably (a) World War I-type of crisis and brutality of the war. It’s probably more like World War I … I couldn’t believe that we’re going to be dealing with that, again, in the 21st century to full scale. You know, conventional was a lot of human life lost, atrocities and a lot of … potential serious war crimes. This is … a very dangerous situation.”

When asked if she thinks Congress is doing enough to help Ukraine, Spartz said inaction has costs and that being proactive is better than being reactive.