House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) speculated Tuesday that President Donald Trump was “just trolling people” with his threat to revoke the security clearances of former senior national security officials who’ve been critical of him publicly.
After Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) suggested Monday that Trump revoke former CIA Director John Brennan’s security clearance, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said at a press briefing that the White House was looking to revoke the clearances of Brennan, former FBI Director James Comey, former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, former National Security Agency Director Michael Hayden, former National Security Adviser Susan Rice and former Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe.
McCabe and Comey, as it happens, didn’t have security clearances to lose.
“Is it dangerous to go down that road?” MSNBC’s Kasie Hunt asked Ryan Tuesday, referring to the White House’s threat.
“I think he’s trolling people, honestly,” Ryan responded. “This is something that’s in the purview of the Executive Branch. I think some of these people have already lost their clearances. Some people keep their clearances.”
“That’s something the Executive Branch deals with, it’s not really in our purview,” Paul added.
Neither the White House nor spokespeople for Paul responded to TPM’s questions about the threat of clearance revocations.
“Making baseless accusations of improper contact with Russia — or being influenced by Russia — against the President is extremely inappropriate,” Sanders said at the press briefing Monday, “and the fact that people with security clearances are making these baseless charges provides inappropriate legitimacy to accusations with zero evidence.”
Speaker Ryan might as well get this tattooed on his forehead.
Because trolling is the epitome of presidential…
That’s a quality we want in a President
Troll this motherfucker
Yup. The old one-size-fits-all trolling excuse.
No backbone. No ethics. No morals. You, Paulie, are one of the architects of this hot mess.
“Modern-day Presidential”, I believe was the term of the art.