Former Trump administration chief of staff Mick Mulvaney on Monday pushed back against the veteran journalist Bob Woodard’s claims in the new book “Rage” that he was against the commander in chief’s strike against Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani.
During an interview on FOX Business’ “Varney & Co” Mulvaney said that although he did not read the entire book yet, he did read the excerpt, and the “most proud part” of his service as chief of staff was the “days surrounding and after” the Soleimani attack.
“Did we consider a bunch of different alternatives before the president took action on Soleimani? Absolutely, that’s exactly what you want the president of the United States to do,” Mulvaney told Stuart Varney.
MEADOWS ADMITS ‘I WOULD NOT HAVE RECOMMENDED’ WOODWARD TO BE GIVEN ACCESS TO TRUMP FOR INTERVIEWS
“The information flow… was as good as I have ever seen. The debates were as intense as I have ever seen. The decision-making was as decisive as I have ever seen and the outcome was as good as we could possibly expect,” Mulvaney added. “I’m not sure what his source is. I usually don’t talk about the private conversations I have with the president but I have absolutely no regrets about how the president handled that situation.”
Earlier Wednesday the Washington Post published audio from the interviews ahead of the release of Woodward’s book, “Rage.” In all, Trump spoke with Woodward 18 times between December of last year and July of this year.
Trump received criticism for describing coronavirus as “deadly stuff” in early February while he was publicly comparing it to seasonal flu. The following month, he admitted to Woodward that he “always wanted to play it down … because I don’t want to create a panic.”
In January, Trump ordered a game-changing U.S. military attack that killed Soleimani, the head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ elite Quds Force, among other military officials at Baghdad International Airport.
Soleimani is the military mastermind whom Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had deemed equally as dangerous as Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi
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Fox News’ Charles Creitz and Ronn Blitzer contributed to this report.
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