WATCH: Rubio: McCabe “should have been allowed to finish through the weekend” pic.twitter.com/Hdjp4ZcSxw
— Meet the Press (@MeetThePress) March 18, 2018
On Friday night, Attorney General Jeff Sessions fired FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe days before his planned retirement. This move, which was undoubtedly supported by Trump, places McCabe’s entire pension in jeopardy after decades of service. Although the Justice Department couched the announcement with accusations that McCabe leaked to the press and made statements that “lacked candor” under oath, the timing of the firing is nothing but ice cold, and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) agrees, as he told Chuck Todd on Meet The Press:
“I don’t like the way it happened. He should’ve been allowed to finish through the weekend … That said, that there’s an inspector general report that’s due and work that’s being done and after he had retired that report would’ve indicated wrongdoing or something that was actionable there’s things that could’ve been done after the fact. But 48 hours to go before retirement I would’ve certainly done it differently. Given the fact there’s still this report out there that hasn’t come in.”
Rubio continued to stress how awful the firing looks, especially since folks are already prone to suspect Trump of ordering the firing (after he needled McCabe for months and even told him to ask his wife how it felt to be a loser). However, McCabe did not leave completely unprepared. Robert Mueller already possesses memos written by McCabe about his Trump nteractions, and there’s bound to be some congressional testimony on the matter soon. Trump’s already trying to argue “fake memos,” but the documents are out there, so stay tuned.
(Via NBC News)