WASHINGTON –U.S. Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) joined “The Evening Edit” on Fox Business Network with Elizabeth MacDonald to discuss the Americans trapped in Haiti, and this week’s House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing about the Biden administration’s disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Excerpts from the interview can be found below, and the full interview can be found on YouTube or Rumble.
MacDONALD: “Well look who’s back. From Senate Armed Services, Senator Tommy Tuberville. Senator, so good to see you again. What’s your reaction to Julia’s report about Haiti here?”
TUBERVILLE: “Well, it’s a disaster, Liz. It’s shocking to see the videos, but it’s really not because the whole world—especially in Africa and Central America—we’re really having problems. Look at [the] Dominican Republic. They’re putting up their own border wall to keep the Haitians from coming over. You think we’d do something like [that] here in the United States. This is the eleventh embassy that Joe Biden’s had to evacuate in only three years. And it’s going to get worse. And sooner or later we’re gone wake up and smell the roses and understand the foreign relations policies are not working in the Biden Administration. We’re getting people killed, we’re having to spend tons of money, and we’ve got people from Alabama that we’re daily trying to get out of Haiti. It’s just an absolute mess.”
MacDONALD: “It’s so sad and unfortunate. Let’s get your reaction to U.S. military commanders who were on the ground, in Afghanistan. They’re talking, [giving] testimony about how badly the White House botched the withdrawal behind the scenes. First, you’re going to hear from an Afghanistan veteran sergeant. Then, you’re going to hear from General Kenneth McKenzie. He served as CENTCOM Commander during the 2021 botched withdrawal. He’s blaming it on bad policy. Then, you’ll hear the former Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman…he’s General Mark Milley. He says the decision came too late to evacuate Americans and civilians. The worry is it came too late. […]
Came too late—are we on our backheels here with Haiti, and other places around the world?”
TUBERVILLE: “Well, what happened in Afghanistan—we all know what happened. People got killed. It was a debacle. It’s caused a lot of these things, Liz, all over the world to happen since then. But that Commander, Commander McKenzie and Milley both knew it was wrong, and they should both have said, ‘Listen, we are stepping down if you’re going to do this.’ That would have been the right thing to do for those two. Don’t stand there and take it. Force the administration to do what you think is right, and don’t give in. That was a terrible decision. They knew it was a terrible decision. And it’s as much of their fault of anybody’s of saying ‘If you’re going to do this, we’re out.’ That’s how bad this decision is.”
MacDONALD: “You know what else looks like a bad decision—the D.C. U.S. Attorney’s office dropped charges against Gold Star Father Steve Nikoui. Nikoui was arrested for disrupting President Biden’s State of the Union address, shouting, ‘Abbey Gate.’ His son was one of thirteen soldiers murdered in the botched exit out of Afghanistan. Why arrest him?”
TUBERVILLE: “Well, communication—right after the speech, Joe Biden—somebody should have gone in his staff, and said, ‘Mr. President, this is what happened,’ and he should have said immediately, ‘Let the guy go. Tell him to come see me tomorrow. We’ll have lunch in the White House. I want to talk to him.’ But there was no communication, they just now dropped the charges—what a debacle. You know, there’s no communication with these people running the White House.”
MacDONALD: “Got it. Senator Tuberville—we love having you on. Thanks for joining us. It’s good to see you again.”
Senator Tommy Tuberville represents Alabama in the United States Senate and is a member of the Senate Armed Services, Agriculture, Veterans’ Affairs, and HELP Committees.
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