OK I get it, a POTUS can declassify info at their will. However, who’s telling a POTUS what should and shouldn’t be kept quiet. Yeah giving the Russian Ambassador info on ISIS and laptop bans might seem as helping fight terror, yet when that POTUS loves to hear his own words and loves an audience someone’s gotta have their finger on the shock collar and that leads to Speaker Ryan’s comments during the campaign. – PB/TK
Republicans Display a Mix of Defense and Alarm on Trump Allegations – By Clare Foran/ May 15 2017
After a report surfaced on Monday that President Trump shared classified information with Russian officials during an Oval Office meeting last week, some Senate Republicans initially rushed to defend the president, while other GOP lawmakers, as well as congressional Democrats, expressed alarm.
“It’s no longer classified the minute he utters it,” Republican Senator Jim Risch said, according to Talking Points Memo’s Alice Ollstein. Risch reportedly noted that the president “has the ability to declassify anything at any time without any process.”
Republican Senator John McCain initially took a similar tack. “We certainly don’t want any president to leak classified information, but the president does have the right to do that,” he said, according to the Associated Press’s Erica Werner. On Twitter, however, McCain shared the report later in the evening and wrote: “If true, deeply disturbing….”
In the House, a spokesman for Republican Speaker Paul Ryan told reporters: “We have no way to know what was said, but protecting our nation’s secrets is paramount. The speaker hopes for a full explanation of the facts from the administration.”
The incident marks the second time in less than a week that congressional Republicans have had to scramble to respond to an immediately controversial move by the president. Last Tuesday, the administration sent shockwaves through official Washington with the news that the president had abruptly fired FBI Director James Comey.
A report in The Washington Post on Monday stated that “President Trump revealed highly classified information to the Russian foreign minister and ambassador in a White House meeting last week, according to current and former U.S. officials, who said that Trump’s disclosures jeopardized a critical source of intelligence on the Islamic State.”
Administration officials quickly pushed back on the allegations. “The story that came out tonight, as reported, is false,” National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster said in a carefully worded statement that did not wade deeply into the substance of the allegations. “The president and the foreign minister reviewed a range of common threats to our two countries,” he said. “At no time were intelligence sources or methods discussed, and the president did not disclose any military operations that were not already publicly known.”
Continue to msn.com article: http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/republicans-display-a-mix-of-defense-and-alarm-on-trump-allegations/ar-BBBb96M?ocid=spartanntp
