This weekend, the Trump administration came out with the news that ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi had apparently died in a raid carried out by U.S. forces in northern Syria. Some aspects of the situation have promptly turned into a political spectacle — Trump and his closest associates have insisted that he deserves some great credit for giving the “green light” for the operation, which apparently, top House leaders like Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) didn’t even know about until after it happened. In a statement after the raid became public, Pelosi denounced this aspect of the raid and insisted that the Trump administration must do better.
She shared:
‘The death of al-Baghdadi is significant, but the death of this ISIS leader does not mean the death of ISIS. Scores of ISIS fighters remain under uncertain conditions in Syrian prisons, and countless others in the region and around the world remain intent on spreading their influence and committing acts of terror… The House must be briefed on this raid, which the Russians but not top Congressional Leadership were notified of in advance.’
As she added on Twitter:
‘@realDonaldTrump must present the American people with a clear strategy to confront ISIS.’
The death of al-Baghdadi is significant, but it does not mean the death of ISIS. @realDonaldTrump must present the American people with a clear strategy to confront ISIS.
— Nancy Pelosi (@SpeakerPelosi) October 27, 2019
As she also noted, there have been serious recent questions about the U.S. capability to actually take ISIS on thanks to the recent abrupt order from Trump for U.S. troops to leave northern Syria, where they’d been fighting the group. Trump dismissed concerns about the situation to the point of suggesting escaped ISIS fighters would just go to Europe, so the situation supposedly didn’t matter much to U.S. interests. As the al-Baghdadi raid indicates — he was wrong.
On Sunday morning television, Vice President Mike Pence suggested that top Congressional leaders were not notified of the impending raid against al-Baghdadi because the administration was concerned about the possibility that the information would leak, and Trump made the same assertion in his Sunday press conference about the issue. As Pelosi noted, the administration did notify Russia of the operation, however — meaning they trusted the government of a totalitarian over U.S. Democrats. That definitely seems to be a trend with them!
Check out Twitter’s response…
