Proving the Republican Party’s only allegiance is to tax cuts for the wealthy, tea partying Florida Rep. Ted Yoho told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer Monday that he too would’ve met with an attorney from a foreign enemy state in an effort to get dirt on a fellow American.
Here’s the brief answer, but jump below to read the longer transcript and watch Wolf Blitzer give Rep. Yoho four consecutive softballs to get him to answer the question with the only ethical, moral, patriotic, and right answer—hell no, I would not collude with a foreign government to defeat a fellow American in an election.
Watch Rep. Yoho put the dumb in the Freedumb Caucus:
Read the exchange below:
Campaign Action
BLITZER: Let's talk about all the breaking news in this Russia investigation. Joining us now Republican congressman Ted Yoho, he's a member of the foreign affairs committee. Congressman, thanks for joining us.
YOHO: Thanks for having me on, Wolf. Look forward to talking to you.
BLITZER: Thank you. Do you believe it was appropriate for Donald Trump, Jr. to take a meeting with a Russian national who promised to provide damaging information to him and his associates involving Hillary Clinton?
YOHO: Do I think it's appropriate. I think I probably would have done the same thing. I mean, it's opposition research. Anybody that's been in an election, you're always looking to get the upper hand. You know, keep in mind she wasn't an official for the Russian government the way understand it. She's a lawyer, Russian lawyer. If somebody comes to us and says, hey, we've got information on an opponent, yeah, I think that's an appropriate thing to do.
BLITZER: But she was apparently well known as somebody who had direct connections to the Kremlin. This is not only a presidential candidate, Hillary Clinton, but a former secretary of state. There are some Republicans, I should point out, who have suggested that if someone like that, a foreign national came to an American with obviously close contacts to the soon to be Republican presidential nominee, that that person should have contacted the FBI about that information. Do you think that was necessary?
YOHO: I think probably going forward that may be what happens, especially in this case where Donald Trump's the president now. But going back, you have to put yourself back at that time frame. At that time frame, I think it's perfectly appropriate for what he did.
BLITZER: In other words, accepting the meeting and just listening, bringing Paul Manafort, the campaign chairman, Jared Kushner, the senior advisor, the president's son-in-law, into a meeting like that, hoping that they would get, quote, dirt on Hillary Clinton?
YOHO: I think that was probably the premise for that meeting. But as Donald, Jr. says, the information that they got, they saw right away that it wasn't leading where they wanted to. He was there to talk more about adoptions and things like that. And then it broke away from that. And, so, you know, I don't want to fault them for what they did. I think I would have done probably the same thing under the same circumstances.
BLITZER: A lot of, including Republicans, are suggesting it was not appropriate. Forget about what emerged from the meeting in a statement on Sunday. He said, I was told that this lawyer might have information helpful to the campaign. I was not told her name prior to the meeting. I guess the fundamental -- would you go to a meeting with someone, some Russian lawyer, not even knowing this person's name, who this person was, just expecting to get some, quote, dirt about Hillary Clinton? Would that be appropriate? Wouldn't you do some serious vetting before you sit down with someone like that?
YOHO: You know, I look back over my own career. We have sat down with some meetings I kind of wished I would have done more vetting. In the future, and we have, and it's a learning process. Again, I don't think it was inappropriate for what he did. If you've got information about an opponent running against you, wouldn't you want that information to vet it, to see if it's real information? And to use it accordingly? You can't do that if you don't have the initial meeting. So, again, I think what he did for the moment he did it at that time was appropriate.
This is not right, not American, and Ted Yoho is not somebody who should be serving in the United States Congress if his commitment is to winning above all else, even at the expense of meeting with foreign enemy states to defeat a fellow American.
As you can imagine, Rep. Ted Yoho felt very, very differently about Hillary Clinton’s emails and the lack of charges. He bemoaned the fact Hillary Clinton “doesn’t believe the rules apply to her.” Now that a Republican occupies the White House, he suddenly has a whole different mindset when it comes to the rules.
“Today’s announcement by FBI Director James Comey, not to seek criminal charges against Hillary Clinton, for her personal emails, is a travesty of justice. Hearing this news, it is hard not to wonder what was discussed during the secret ‘cordial’ meeting between her husband Bill and Attorney General Loretta Lynch. Is there any wonder why the American people are so frustrated with the political elites in Washington?
“Hillary was extremely careless with classified information. She sent over a hundred classified emails from her personal unsecured server. This is a clear example of how she doesn’t believe the rules apply to her. If she can’t be trusted with classified information as Secretary of State, how in the world are we supposed to trust her if she made it to the White House?
“Charges should be brought up against her and her negligent actions. She felt she was above the law and now she is getting away with it. Anyone else that had been so careless in their responsibilities would have been in court by now or at a minimum, relieved from their responsibilities and duties.”