House Speaker Paul Ryan was curiously quick to chastise President Obama for taking too long to sanction Russia for meddling in the 2016 elections.
Fascinating, Obama’s actions are "overdue” and he “failed,” but in terms of exploring just what exactly what went wrong—nada. In essence, let’s just put this one to bed now, ladies and gents. That stands in stark contrast to a joint statement from GOP Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham, who also called the sanctions “overdue,” but added:
Ultimately, they are a small price for Russia to pay for its brazen attack on American democracy. We intend to lead the effort in the new Congress to impose stronger sanctions on Russia.
Both Ryan and Mitch McConnell have been trying to weasel their way out of putting together a select committee to investigate Russian interference in 2016.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Speaker Paul Ryan insist the existing committees — such as the Senate and House Intelligence panels — can handle the probe.
Meanwhile, McCain and Graham have been mounting a campaign for a more aggressive approach than simply letting the issue be handled by committees, which will be uniformly controlled by Republicans and therefore subject to partisan influence.
For Russia’s part, one official was all too happy to ridicule the sanctions as strictly belonging to the “outgoing administration,” the “lame ducks,” and the “political corpses.” Looks like they assume the incoming administration will be striking a more favorable tone toward them.