Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele responded to the announcement of the DOJ’s torture investigation today on Fox News, saying that the timing is a stunt to distract from the health care debate.
“The timing of this is always very interesting,” Steele said, the announcement coming “while we try to deal with their failure to deal with, sufficiently and I think smartly, the health care issue that the nation is currently confronted with.”
The anchor, Neil Cavuto, asked if Steele thinks it’s politically motivated.
“Just a pinch, not a whole lot,” Steele said sarcastically. “You think? I mean, absolutely.” He added that the Democrats are trying to use it to influence the upcoming gubernatorial elections in New Jersey and Virginia.
“Every time they find themselves against a wall on a policy issue … they found a boogeyman,” he said, saying that “boogeyman” is former President Bush and his administration.
Steele also said the investigation into the CIA is “unfortunate.”
“The attorney general did not get the memo from the president … to look forward and not backward,” he said. (The White House has said repeatedly that it is entirely up to the attorney general, Eric Holder, to make decisions about investigations.)
Steele said it’s a mistake to be “second guessing decisions you’re making on war and peace and terrorism,” saying President Obama doesn’t know what sort of decisions he’ll have to make.
“He doesn’t know what lies ahead of him,” he said.
