GOP Rep. Mike Rogers: Bergdahl Swap Has ‘Empowered the Taliban’

Appearing on ABC’s This Week, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers (R-MI) declared that the prisoner exchange that will bring Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl home has effectively “empowered the Taliban.”

“We’ve made a serious, serious geopolitical mistake,” the lawmaker told host George Stephanopoulos. “We’ve empowered the Taliban. The one thing they wanted more than anything was recognition from the U.S. government, so they can use that to propagandize against areas that are unsecure still in Afghanistan.”

Rogers also lamented the timing of the swap, noting that the administration had just recently announced its intentions to withdraw U.S. troops from Afghanistan by the end of 2015. This sends “the wrong message at the wrong time,” he asserted.

“We’re going to pay for this decision for years,” Rogers concluded.

Watch below, via ABC:

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