Politics

McCain Drops WICKED One-Liner On McCaskill For Dragging Politics Into Intel Hearing

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Phillip Stucky Political Reporter
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Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill took her time Thursday on the Senate Armed Services Committee intel hearing on Russian hacking to go on a bit of a spiel about Donald Trump, and Sen. John McCain followed with a rather brusque one-liner.

McCaskill spent seven minutes questioning Director of National Intelligence James Clapper about his extensive service over the course of his long career, capping off the point with the question, “does the experience of those working in intelligence mirror your own?” Clapper responded by saying he had confidence in the work of those in the intelligence sector.

“I want to thank the chairman, and I want to thank Senator Graham and others, there have been others, I can count on maybe a little bit more than one hand, who have stood up in a nonpolitical way to defend the intelligence community over the last few weeks,” McCaskill argued in the committee.

“The notion that the soon-elected leader of this country would put Julian Assange on a pedestal compared to the men and women of the intelligence community and the military that is so deeply embedded in the intelligence community.”

“I think it should bring about an hue and cry, no matter whether you’re a republican or democrat, there should be howls,” McCaskill concluded. “And mark my word, if the roles were reversed, there would be howls from the republican side of the aisle. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.”

McCain’s simple but biting comment elicited cheers and laughter from members of the committee and members of the audience alike. “Thank you for that nonpartisan comment.”

President-elect Trump denied several times that Russia was officially involved in the hacking and later publishing of Clinton campaign staffer emails, a move that Democrats equate to “hacking the election.”

Julian Assange, the creator of Wikileaks defended the email hack on Sean Hannity’s show, claiming that the source was not an official source from Russia.

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