“Fox & Friends” co-host Brian Kilmeade on Friday said President Trump had “re-founded ISIS” and was giving Russia “a big win” with his decision to pull U.S. troops from Syria.
Kilmeade made the remarks during an interview with White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders.
“He also is doing exactly what he criticized President Obama for doing. He said President Obama is the founder of ISIS,” Kilmeade pointed out. “He just refounded ISIS because they have 30,000 men there and they are already striking back with our would-be evacuation. The president is really on the griddle with this.”
{mosads}Sanders said she “respectfully and vehemently ” disagreed with Kilmeade.
“The idea that the president has had anything to do with helping ISIS reemerge is absolutely outrageous,” she said.
“Leaving is helping,” Kilmeade said. “Leaving is helping.”
Sanders responded that Trump would “destroy” ISIS.
“If ISIS wants to pick a fight with somebody, they sure as heck don’t want to pick one with Donald Trump because he will destroy them and defeat them,” Sanders said. “He’s made that extremely clear.”
Sanders said that U.S. forces have “wiped out 99 percent of ISIS in Syria.”
Kilmeade responded that the “word on the ground” among U.S. military is different from what the White House claims.
The hosts then abruptly wished Sanders a “merry Christmas” and ended the segment.
Kilmeade, a frequent supporter of the president’s, earlier in the morning fiercely criticized Trump for pulling U.S. forces out of Syria and leaving Kurdish forces in the area alone.
“We are now abandoning the Kurds who are about three weeks away from total slaughter,” Kilmeade said. “All they have done for us is show total allegiance to us and they trusted us, and now we will never get another ally in that region.”
Trump has vowed to withdraw from Syria, which is in the midst of a civil war, since he was on the campaign trail in 2016.
He announced the decision to pull troops from the country on Wednesday.
Defense Secretary James Mattis, who disagreed with the decision, on Thursday said he would resign.
In a letter notable for its breaks with Trump, he said the president deserved a secretary “whose views are better aligned with yours.”