Adam Kinzinger Takes a Hatchet to Biden’s ‘Terrible’ Speech: He Focused on Stopping the ‘Political Bleeding’ From This ‘Disaster’
During an appearance on The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer on CNN Monday, Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-IL) slammed President Joe Biden’s speech earlier in the day about the situation in Afghanistan.
Host Wolf Blitzer teed up Kinzinger by saying that “President Biden stands by his decision. That there was never going to be a good time to withdraw from Afghanistan. He wasn’t willing to force this war on another generation. What was your reaction to his speech today? He spoke for about 18 minutes.”
In response, Kinzinger took a hatchet to what he called a “terrible” speech.
“It was a speech that, to me, seemed like it was focused on stemming the upcoming political fallout from his decision and from this disaster. Now Wolf, we are being filled and inundated right now with people in the Republicans and the Democrats pointing the fingers at who’s to blame on this.”
Kinzinger, an Air Force veteran who served in Afghanistan, went on to “say something that probably most politicians don’t say.”
“The Republicans have failed you and the Democrats have failed you. The last president failed you on Afghanistan, and this one is failing you on Afghanistan,” he said. “Because the last one cut a terrible deal when the secretary of state stood with the now-president of Afghanistan under the Taliban and released 5,000 Taliban prisoners.”
“President Biden had an opportunity to right that wrong,” continued Kinzinger. “President Biden should understand that the chaos you’re seeing now is just the beginning of what Afghanistan is going to be and that the vast majority of combat operations, all these people that are saying the Afghan military melted away, they were doing all of the fighting.”
Kinzinger went on to explain that “In 2014, we basically said we’ll do the logistics and the air support if you do the ground combat. And the Afghans were fighting on the ground.”
“But the second the United States abandoned them, I mean, even faster than our European allies who are like, you are leaving right now? Wait a second,” he continued. “When any military loses logistics and it loses air support, you can’t expect them to necessarily stay and fight. I wish they would have fought more. But the president’s speech today was aimed at stemming political bleeding and it was not the kind of leadership that we need in a president that, frankly, has been lacking in both the last administration and now this one.”
Watch above, via CNN.
