Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal — attempting to gin up interest in a possible presidential bid — came out swinging Wednesday against fellow Republican Rand Paul, saying the Kentucky senator is “unsuited to be commander-in-chief.”
Jindal specifically criticized Paul for this comment he made on MSNBC Wednesday: “ISIS exists and grew stronger because of the hawks in our party, who gave arms indiscriminately, and most of those arms were snatched up by ISIS.”
“This is a perfect example of why Senator Paul is unsuited to be commander-in-chief,” Jindal said of the libertarian-leaning lawmaker’s comments. “We have men and women in the military who are in the field trying to fight ISIS right now, and Senator Paul is taking the weakest, most liberal Democrat position.”
While Paul is running an anti-Washington campaign, Jindal, in his statement, emphasized the location of Paul’s day job.
“It’s one thing for Senator Paul to take an outlandish position as a senator at Washington cocktail parties, but being commander-in-chief is an entirely different job,” Jindal said. “We should all be clear that evil and Radical Islam are at fault for the rise of ISIS, and people like President Obama and Hillary Clinton exacerbate it.”
Jindal has formed an exploratory committee, with plans to announce his decision on a race this summer.
Paul’s team fired back at Jindal in a statement provided to The Daily Caller.
“It’s ironic Gov Jindal would level such a charge when he flip-flops on crucial issues like Common Core and national security, and he has cratered his own state’s economy and budget,” senior adviser Doug Stafford said.
“Just last week, Gov. Jindal spoke out in support of Sen. Paul and announced he now opposes the NSA’s illegal and unnecessary domestic bulk data collection, after previously cheerleading for it,” Stafford added. “As we have seen for the past few weeks, Senator Paul is the only Republican running it seems who is willing to learn from our mistakes in the Middle East in order to keep us safer and stronger. The American people are looking for a candidate who can express a coherent viewpoint, something Gov. Jindal and many other candidates have been unable to do thus far.”