GOP Congressman Who Said Russian Hackers Did Media’s Job Now Says His Comments ‘Were Completely Misconstrued’ (They Weren’t)

‘Those Comments Were Completely Misconstrued’

U.S. Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ) isn’t backing down from comments he made praising Russia’s hackers, but he is saying that they were taken out of context and misconstrued. Franks appeared on MSNBC Thursday afternoon, telling Americans that the Russian government – which President Barack Obama had just sanctioned for interfering in the U.S. election and for other acts – was merely acting in its own self-interest and did what the U.S. media should have done. 

“If Russia succeeded in giving the American people information that was accurate, then they merely did what the media should have done,” said Congressman Franks, who chairs the House subcommittee on the Constitution and sits on the House Judiciary Committee.

Franks, a three-term Republican whose name is frequently mentioned by far right wing conservatives as a possible candidate for nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court, took to CNN Friday afternoon to push back against the many reports and angry Americans who have been calling him a “traitor” and accusing him of treason on social media, suggesting he be deported to Russia.

“Those comments were completely misconstrued,” Franks insisted, not explaining how. “No one has been harder on Russia than me. I have been deeply committed to making sure their expansionism and their efforts did not result in the deaths of innocent people across the world.”

That does not explain why he thinks the media should hack into the servers and email accounts of U.S. politicians and political operatives.

Fransk also told CNN Friday that, unlike most Democrats and Republicans, he believes – as does the Trump camp – that President Barack Obama sanctioning the Putin’s government is merely an “opportunity to try to use Russia to, quote, ‘delegitimize’ the election of Donald Trump to be the president.”

“I find that stunning,” Franks, who supported Trump during the primaries, said. “I am completely convinced that Barack Obama’s primary motivation here is to try to delegitimize the election here.”

CNN’s Jim Sciutto pushed back on Franks’ claim that Obama’s “primary motivation is to delegitimize the election,” and his claim that the media ignored the Wikileaks leaks. Both claims are ludicrous.

Watch:

President Barack Obama has made clear – as has Hillary Clinton and many others – that Donald Trump was duly elected president.

“We’ve seen Vladimir Putin mop the world with our president,” Franks also said:

Franks is among the most conservative of all House Republicans. He vehemently opposes the rights of same-sex couples to marry, the rights of women to choose to have abortions, he even opposes the rights of Native Americans to open casinos. He is a climate change denier, and voted against reauthorizing the Violence Against Women Act.

Some responses via Twitter: