Former Virginia Congressman Denver Riggleman has been busy since he left office, including doing humanitarian work in war-torn Ukraine.
He returned from his most recent trip early Thursday morning after spending recent days dodging drone strikes.
Russian attacks across Ukraine last night, targeting civilian population centers. Ken Harbaugh, in Odessa for VALOR and @MeidasTouch, spent the night in a bomb shelter after shooting this video. The whining sound you hear is not an air raid siren, but multiple Shahed drones. They… pic.twitter.com/1I8tPxIVRY
— Valor Media Network (@ValorMediaNet) June 3, 2025
In a video shot on one night of his trip, the former Fifth District Congressman turned humanitarian, writer and podcaster can be seen running from Russian drones as they strike the Ukrainian port city of Odessa.
"We're meeting in basements and bunkers and I'm eating Borscht with chicken hearts," Riggleman told Radio IQ Thursday morning. "While 800 meters away is the left bank of Kherson where snipers and drones are launched against civilians in the town."
"To hear drones going overhead, within very close distances to you, puts you at a pucker factor," he said, noting he hit a pucker factor of eight that night, trying to make light of what was obviously a traumatic situation, "even as former military.”
Riggleman spent some time in Eastern Europe when he was in the Air Force and he was invited back late last year to deliver armored ambulances and medical supplies. But locals asked him to return. And it was just in time for the headline-making, surprise Ukrainian drone attack which reportedly left large portions of Russia’s military air force in shambles.
“After that attack you could see the morale go up, but simultaneously, since I was there when it happened, they also retaliated with indiscriminate drone strikes,” he said of the chorus of drones and bombs he heard in the wake of Operation Spider Web.
Riggleman is now safely back at home in Central Virginia. But he returned with renewed vigor and hope for those living and fighting in Ukraine and disdain for President Donald Trump’s handling of the conflict.
“I get to come back to beautiful America, and the safety of our incredible country while we have an administration that really caters to Putin’s lies, either on purpose or on accident,” he said.
Riggleman is planning to turn interviews and video he’s collected on his recent trip into a book and movie.
This report, provided by Virginia Public Radio, was made possible with support from the Virginia Education Association.
