McCain blasts Trump: 'There's nothing "America First"' about believing Putin

pulse

November 11, 2017 11:51 PM

McCain unloaded on Trump, saying that believing Putin over the US intelligence community was "naive" and a national security risk.

Sen. John McCain criticized President Donald Trump on Saturday after Trump said he believed Vladimir Putin's claim that Russia did not interfere in the 2016 election.
McCain said believing Putin and not the US intelligence community "is not only naive but also places our national security at risk."
Trump has long been reluctant to accept that Russia interfered in the election, and he called former intelligence officials who said otherwise "political hacks."

Sen. John McCain of Arizona blasted President Donald Trump on Saturday after Trump said he believed Russian President Vladimir Putin's denials that Russia interfered in the 2016 US election.

"There's nothing 'America First' about taking the word of a KGB colonel over that of the American intelligence community," McCain said in a statement. "There's no 'principled realism' in cooperating with Russia to prop up the murderous Assad regime, which remains the greatest obstacle to a political solution that would bring an end to the bloodshed in Syria."

McCain was referring to Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, a strongman and authoritarian leader who has been accused of multiple human rights abuses since he took power.

"Vladimir Putin does not have America's interests at heart," McCain continued. "To believe otherwise is not only naive but also places our national security at risk."

The Arizona Republican's statement came following Trump's comments to reporters Saturday morning about a meeting he had with Putin on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit.

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