On Monday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Special Report,” Rep. Mike Waltz (R-FL), who is President-Elect Donald Trump’s pick to be national security adviser, said that the jury is still out on the new leadership inside Syria and commented on the possibility of radical Islamists gaining possession of the chemical weapons the Assad regime had by stating that “President Trump was elected with an overwhelming mandate to not get the United States drug into any more Middle Eastern wars. That doesn’t mean he’s not willing to absolutely step in. Remember when Assad used chemical weapons years ago and he did take decisive action” and “President Trump has no problem taking decisive action if the American homeland is threatened in any way.”
Waltz said, “Well, Bret, it is good that Assad is gone. But it clearly leaves a vacuum and our jury is out on this group HTS and its leader Julani, which is a declared terrorist. On the one hand, though, he’s not, at least so far, beheading former Assad regime officials or hanging them from bridges. They do seem to be sitting and talking, which is a very — which is a good initial first sign. But President Trump and our team are watching very closely and we’re also watching very closely the tens of thousands of ISIS fighters and their families that are still held in camps from when President Trump, in his first term, cleaned up and destroyed the ISIS caliphate. We have to keep a close eye on that and the Kurds that are watching them, and then, finally, of course, we’ll always stand with Israel. And we should not miss an opportunity to say, but for Israel’s leadership, Bibi Netanyahu’s strong actions that took out Hezbollah, [have] put Iran on its back foot, [have] put them in a weakened position, coupled with Russia being bogged down in Ukraine, that no one was there to come to the help of Assad like they have been in the past. So, this is a moment that we’ll see how this turns out, but our core interests are ISIS, Israel, our Gulf Arab allies, and, of course, … finding the whereabouts of Austin Tice.”
Host Bret Baier then asked, “President-Elect Trump, on Truth Social, said, ‘The United States should have nothing to do with it. This is not our fight. Let it play out. Do not get involved!’ Are you concerned, at all, about radical Islamists inside Syria getting ahold of the chemical weapons that we, the U.S., [know] Bashar al-Assad had?”
Waltz responded, “Well, look, Bret, President Trump was elected with an overwhelming mandate to not get the United States drug into any more Middle Eastern wars. That doesn’t mean he’s not willing to absolutely step in. Remember when Assad used chemical weapons years ago and he did take decisive action. Fortunately, Israel, again, with Bibi’s leadership, has taken down some of those sites. And we are all watching them closely and President Trump has no problem taking decisive action if the American homeland is threatened in any way.”
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
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