The head of the House Armed Services Committee said Wednesday that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton would handle military matters better than President Obama if elected the next commander-in-chief.
Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, said Clinton would likely approach national security in a stronger way that Obama.
“I think Secretary Clinton over her career has shown herself to be for stronger positions when it comes to national security and I think she has the benefit of seeing all the chaos that the Obama administration is leaving us with. So I think it would be somewhat better,” Thornberry told reporters at the National Press Club.
Thornberry also said he thought Clinton would have a better relationship with Congress than Obama, who has repeatedly angered Republicans with his use of executive actions.
“The Obama administration approach to Congress has been very dismissive. It was much better during President Bill Clinton’s day and I’m sure Mrs. Clinton would learn from that,” he said. “So it would be different, how big that difference would be, we can talk about that later.”
Thornberry said he has not decided which Republican he will support in the race for the White House, but that whomever takes over as the next commander-in-chief will inherit a “whale of a mess” from the Obama administration.
Thornberry also pushed back against Obama’s assertions in Tuesday night’s State of the Union speech that rhetoric declaring that enemies are getting stronger as America is getting weaker is just “political hot air.”
“The world is more dangerous today than it was in 2009 and despite the president’s claim last night, that is not just hot air. That’s the facts,” Thornberry said. “It’s also the reality that it’s unlikely the Obama administration is going to do anything over the next year that’s going to change that fact.
“No president is irrelevant, but in many respects I think the country and the world are moving on,” he said.
