CNN anchor: White House thinks the US is a ‘military dictatoriship’

CNN anchor Erin Burnett said on Friday that the White House appears to think the U.S. is a military dictatorship after press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said it was “inappropriate” to question chief of staff John Kelly, who is a retired four star general. 

“A military dictatorship — that appears to be what the White House thinks the United States is. Today when pressed about false statements made by chief of staff Gen. John Kelly about Congresswoman Frederica Wilson, White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said it’s inappropriate to question a four star general,” Burnett said on her show “Out Front.”

{mosads}”It is appropriate to question the general. It was when we questioned him last night and it still is tonight. Questioning is fair, but Kelly’s own boss, the man he’s trying to defend in this whole controversy over the call to the family of a soldier killed in the Niger ambush, President Trump has no problem insulting, let alone questioning four star generals,” she continued. 

Burnett’s comments come after Sanders defended Kelly on Friday. She pushed back on reporters questions about Kelly’s comments on Rep. Frederica Wilson (D-Fla.). 

“If you want to go after Gen. Kelly, that’s up to you, but I think if you want to get into a debate with a four-star Marine general, I think that’s something highly inappropriate,” Sanders said at the White House press briefing. 

Kelly criticized Wilson for describing a conversation she heard between Trump and the widow of a soldier killed in Niger. He had also mischaracterized remarks made by Wilson at the dedication of a building to fallen FBI agents in 2015, referring to Wilson as an “empty barrel.”

However, Sanders issued a statement to media outlets on Friday night, saying everyone can be questioned. 

“Of course everyone can be questioned but after witnessing General Kelly’s heartfelt and somber account, we should all be able to agree that impugning his credibility on how best to honor fallen heroes in not appropriate,” she said. 

In statement on Kelly flap, Sarah Huckabee Sanders concedes that “everyone can be questioned.” But: pic.twitter.com/Df6ZACmSsD

— ErikWemple (@ErikWemple) October 20, 2017