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In a strong performance on fake news channel CNN Tuesday evening, Senator Rand Paul doubled down on comments he made last week, saying “somebody should go to jail” for leaking fake intelligence regarding Donald Trump and the Russian government.
“I think it’s unseemly that people in our intelligence community, the CIA director, is out there giving press conferences, criticizing the incoming president — I think that’s inexcusable and I would not have anybody in the CIA that’s publicly criticizing the president.” Paul told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, who has continued to defend CNN’s coverage of the Trump/Russia blackmail fake news story.
“It’s not their job, it’s not their role and it’s frankly, unseemly, and it takes away from the credibility.” Paul continued.
“Look, the intelligence community has had a great loss of credibility in the last couple of years. James Clapper came to the Senate and lied under oath. Now we have the head of the CIA publicly criticizing the incoming president. I think that’s not the role of the CIA.” the Kentucky Senator urged.
“The CIA should be in the background trying to protect our country and not out there trying to score political points. I think it’s a terrible and tragic day, and it hurts all of our intelligence gathering and their credibility to have the head of the CIA out there doing this.” Paul, who is a member of the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.
Blitzer attempted to muddy the waters by suggesting that the CIA head John Brennan has “the right to defend the men and women in the intelligence community,” suggesting that Trump called them all Nazis, but Paul wasn’t taking the bait.
“I think it’s very important that private information that’s discussed in private intelligence briefings be private,” Paul said, adding “Classified information should not be leaked to the press. I don’t know who did this, but I can tell you in all likelihood, it wasn’t a Republican. It wasn’t Donald Trump. It wasn’t his people. So you have a couple of choices. This was either leaked to networks and other organizations by intelligence officials or by Democrats that are part of the elite eight that get these briefings.”
As Trump contended last week, the source of the leaks appears to be from within the intelligence community, given that following a secret meeting with intelligence officials that no one on Trump’s staff even knew about, leaks occurred almost immediately afterwards.
“There’s only a few people who could have leaked this information.” Paul stated. “The reason why this is important is that you don’t want public officials who are being blackmailed to be afraid to go to the FBI and say here’s this information. If a public official takes private information that you are being blackmailed with to the FBI and then it leaks into the public domain, that is inexcusable, and really somebody should go to jail and we have not talked about this enough.”
“A leak like that is so significant if it came from the intelligence community, they should go to jail. If it came from the Obama administration, they should go to jail. You cannot allow the leaking of classified documents, particularly whens it goes to someone’s character So I think this is a tragedy and Donald Trump is right to be mad.” The Senator declared.
Blitzer twice more asked Paul if he agreed with Trump “that the CIA is like Nazi Germany.”
Again Paul refused to take the bait, saying “I can only vouch for what I’m for and for my statements.”
“It’s inexcusable and someone should be prosecuted, and it’s not just about this instance. It’s about how we move forward as a country.” Paul concluded.