During Monday’s “Fox & Friends” on FNC, Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) sounded off on former Obama National Security Advisor Susan Rice claiming over the weekend that President Donald Trump picks Russia President Vladimir Putin “over our troops.” Rice’s remarks came in response to reports that Russian intelligence offered Afghan militants bounties to kill U.S. soldiers, but the White House did not act when it learned of the intelligence.
Cotton said Rice, who is on 2020 presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden’s shortlist to serve as his vice president, “was the Typhoid Mary of the Obama-era foreign policy,” adding he is not surprised to see her “distorting” facts in an effort to be Biden’s vice president selection.
“As the president’s national security adviser has said, as the Department of Defense has said and now that the intelligence community has said, this intelligence was not corroborated, it was not verified, it was not briefed to the president for that reason. But it’s not surprising to me that Susan Rice, in an effort to be Joe Biden’s vice president, is distorting those facts,” Cotton outlined. “Susan Rice was the Typhoid Mary of the Obama-era foreign policy, and Joe Biden, as Secretary of Defense Bob Gates has said, has been wrong about every major foreign policy decision of the last 40 years, so those two would go together very well.”
He compared the two most recent administrations’ records on dealing with Russia, saying, “President Obama stood by as Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine. When Ukraine begged for defensive aid, they sent blankets. President Trump sent Javelin anti-tank missiles. Let’s look at President Obama’s record on arms control. He negotiated a terrible arms control treaty with Russia that leaves us at risk of being outgunned by Russia and China combined. President Trump has been eliminating obsolete arms control treaties from the Cold War. So, at every turn, President Trump has been much tougher on Russia than President Obama ever was.”
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