Hollywood power couple Mila Kunis and Ashton Kutcher launched a GoFundMe campaign to help send relief supplies to the Ukrainian people and in five days have raised almost $17 million of their $30 million goal.
On the campaign’s fundraising page, Kunis explained, “Today, I am a proud Ukrainian. While my family came to the United States in 1991, I was born in Chernivtsi, Ukraine in 1983. Ukrainians are proud and brave people who deserve our help in their time of need. This unjust attack on Ukraine and humanity at large is devastating and the Ukrainian people need our support. Our family is starting this fund to help provide immediate support and we will be matching up to $3 million.”
Kunis also noted many Ukrainian refugees left everything behind to escape the Russian invasion of their country. She explained the fundraiser would provide “an immediate impact on refugee and humanitarian aid efforts.”
Supported by Flexport.org and Airbnb, the campaign’s goal is to raise $30 million. As of Monday, more than 16,000 people have donated, raising $16,984,600. Besides Kunis and Kutcher’s $3 million donation, there have been four other donors giving more than $2 million or more.
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On Saturday, the couple posted a short video update to social media with Ryan Peterson, the founder of Flexport.org, and Brian Chesky, one of the founders of the hosting website Airbnb.
Peterson explained the campaign has partnered with the United Nations’ UNICEF project Hope and Project Cure and other aid organizations to make sure all of the purchased supplies go directly to people in need.
Chesky said his company has worked with Airbnb hosts to provide free housing for up to 100,000 refugees in Poland, Germany, Hungary, and countries to the west of Ukraine.
“We’re going to make this happen,” Kutcher said. “There are some problems in the world that take a village to solve. And there are other problems that take the rest of the world. This is one of those other problems.”
15 million…Halfway there wanted you to meet the people who are helping make it happen. #StandWithUkraine️ @Airbnb @flexport pic.twitter.com/tZf0LtpwiI
— ashton kutcher (@aplusk) March 6, 2022
Meanwhile, on the other side of the U.S., a Ukrainian Catholic congregation in Boston, Massachusetts, has been busy gathering medical supplies, food, and other necessities to send to their fellow countrymen as they fight against the Russian forces who have invaded Ukraine.
The Boston Herald reports members of the Christ The King Ukrainian Catholic Church in the Jamaica Plain neighborhood of Boston have turned their church rectory into a wartime supply depot for Ukraine’s citizen militias.
During the day, packages arrive at the church building. At night, church volunteers unpack and sort the items, getting them ready to ship overseas as soon as possible.
“Right now this is a question of life or death, freedom or oppression. Our nation already chose freedom. They will fight to death,” Rev. Yaroslav Nalysnyk, the pastor of the church told The Herald.
Nalysnyk, a former doctor in Ukraine’s military, said his parishioners wanted to do something to help. Within days after Russia’s invasion, the Boston congregation started an Amazon wish list to send supplies to Ukrainian troops.
Myron Kravchuk, one volunteer, told The Herald in a video shared to YouTube how grateful the church is for the support of the American people.
“This is a day and a half worth of supplies that we’ve received from the local community of Ukrainians and Americans who are supporting us,” another volunteer Yuliya Pokhylko said in the video.
“It’s phenomenal,” she added. “And all of this that’s going to, you know, to save lives. It feels pretty amazing.”
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