Here is a portrait in cowardice the likes of which we hope not see again.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) spoke with Bloomberg’s Kevin Cirilli on ‘Bloomberg Daybreak: Americas’ to weigh in on the news that Republican President Trump leaked highly classified information about an ISIS plot to the Russians.
McConnell’s response was a call for less drama.
“I think we can do with a little less drama from the White House on a lot of things,” McConnell said Tuesday morning.
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“I think it would be helpful if the president spent more time on things we’re trying to accomplish and less time on other things,” was McConnell’s ‘change the subject who cares if the country is being attacked from within’ response.
McConnell put leaking highly classified information into a box labeled “drama” and could only muster the will to say we could do with a little less drama. Bold words these are not.
Here’s a real kicker. McConnell also recommended Merrick Garland to replace FBI director James Comey. Trump fired Comey days after Comey asked for more resources for his investigation into whether or not Trump and/or his campaign colluded with Russia.
Is this the kind of “drama” McConnell is referring to?
Garland is the guy McConnell refused to even give a vote to when President Obama nominated him to the Supreme Court, for the seat McConnell stole from Obama (quite literally) to give to Trump so a Republican could pick a partisan judge.
Republicans are suggesting Garland to replace Comey because they want to open a seat on the bench on which Garland sits as a Chief Judge – U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. As qualified as Garland is to be on the Supreme Court (he would have been the perfect SCOTUS justice, his ethics are impeccable and he is nonpartisan), he might not be the best person to run the FBI given the need to focus on an investigation into President Trump’s possible collusion with Russia.
Republicans overlooked an important fact on the Garland front, though, since the Atlantic points out that Garland could actually accept the job and keep his seat, granting himself a leave of absence. Though Garland is unlikely to pull such a stunt; we leave such potentially unethical if legal moves to the President and his party.
McConnell can’t even manage to address the fact that President Trump put not only our country in danger but also our allies and the brave men and women who are working to defeat ISIS in danger.
This tepid, cowardly response of calling for less drama belongs in a museum of what not to do when your party’s president has just given highly classified information to the Russians.
Mitch McConnell is more committed to his own agenda and power than the national security of the U.S.
Republicans aligning themselves with Trump are revealing that the party has no actual principles anymore. Republicans used to the be the party of national security, but here they are, enabling the destruction of our country and justifying giving classified secrets about an ISIS plot to an adversary.
Image: ‘Bloomberg Daybreak: Americas’ screengrab
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Sarah has been credentialed to cover President Barack Obama, then VP Joe Biden, 2016 Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, and exclusively interviewed Speaker Nancy Pelosi multiple times and exclusively covered her first home appearance after the first impeachment of then President Donald Trump.
Sarah is two-time Telly award winning video producer and a member of the Society of Professional Journalists.
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