White House press secretary Sarah Sanders Friday vehemently denied a comment from a Fox News host that President Donald Trump's decision to pull troops from Syria means his decision has "refounded ISIS."
"The idea that the president has had anything to do with helping ISIS reemerge is absolutely outrageous," Sanders told "Fox & Friends" co-host Brian Kilmeade, after he told her the president's decision had given "Russia a big win."
"Vladimir Putin praised him," Kilmeade told her. "He is also doing exactly what he criticized President [Barack] Obama for doing. He said President Obama is the founder of ISIS. He [Trump] just refounded ISIS because they have 30,000 men there and they are already striking back with our would-be evacuation. The president is really on the griddle with this."
"President Trump has put so much emphasis on rebuilding the strongest military on the face of the planet," Sanders retorted. "If ISIS wants to pick a fight with somebody, they sure as heck don't want to pick one with Donald Trump. He will destroy them and defeat them. He has made that extremely clear. We have wiped out 99 percent of ISIS in Syria."
Trump, she added, does not wish to stay "in the middle of a civil war in the Middle East and continue to put American lives on the line. If we need to fight ISIS again the president is not afraid to do it."
Sanders also said that anyone who says they are surprised about the troop drawdowns in Syria and in Afghanistan should come as no surprise, as he's been talking about the plans for the past couple of years and made it a campaign promise.
"Anybody that says they're surprised by this has simply been living under a rock," said Sanders. "The president has been talking about this since the campaign. He brought it up again 8 months ago, six months ago. He has wanted to bring our troops home.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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