Donald Trump’s campaign accused former CIA Director Leon Panetta of hypocrisy Wednesday night, after Panetta attacked Trump on national security grounds but ignored Hillary Clinton’s carelessness with State Department emails when she was in the government.
“It is alarming that Leon Panetta would, through his silence, excuse Hillary Clinton’s enablement of foreign espionage with her illegal email scheme and her corrupt decision to then destroy those emails and dissemble her ‘private’ server to hide her crimes from the public and authorities,” Stephen Miller, senior policy advisor to the Trump campaign, said in a statement.
In his Wednesday night speech, Panetta accused Trump of asking the Russians to “engage in hacking or intelligence against the United States to affect our election.” He also said a Trump presidency would threaten world peace.
Panetta’s comments come on the heels of early Wednesday comments by Trump, when he told reporters at a press conference in Miami that he hopes the Russians can share emails Clinton erased from the private server she used when serving as secretary of state, if Russia has them.
Panetta also amped up Clinton’s foreign policy accomplishments while secretary of state.
“He better than most should know how many lives she put at risk. At the same time, Panetta ignored Hillary Clinton’s rush to war in the Middle East and her deadly and calamitous invasion of Libya which further proves her a reckless risk too grave for any American family,” Miller said.
