House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-California) said Monday that he did not lie last week when he deliberately denied the true story.
This was reported by the New York Times That McCarthy was so angry with President Donald Trump for inciting unrest in the Capitol on January 6, 2021, that he said he would tell Trump to step down. McCarthy denied the story, only to see reporters confirm this fact by recording his statements.
In his first interview since the news broke, McCarthy avoided asking about his personal proposal for Trump’s resignation, pointing out that he didn’t.
“I didn’t tell the president to get off,” McCarthy told Fox News in a live interview in Eagle Pass, Texas, where a Republican delegation is leaving to emphasize border security. “It’s a conversation we have about future scenarios.”
McCarthy then headed to the border. “Our border is unguarded,” he said, breaking down statistics on border crossings and fentanyl.
But Fox News reporter Bill Melugin went on to ask McCarthy if he lied when he called the Times story “wrong and misleading,” even if it was accurate.
McCarthy responded by saying he simply denied that he directly told Trump to step down.
“What brought me down was I called the president to tell him to step down,” McCarthy said. “I did not ask the president to step down. He and I have a good relationship.
But no one said McCarthy told Trump to step down. The story is McCarthy told members of the House Republican ruling group on Jan. 10, 2021 that he could call the president and tell him to step down before facing possible impeachment and dismissal.
“I think it will pass and I would advise you to step down,” he told Trump. According to the note.
McCarthy suggests that Times reporters told him before the news that he was telling the president to step down. But he still called the story “completely wrong and wrong” even when it came out, in the sense that he knew he was describing it to his colleagues and not to Trump.
The California Republican released a factual statement throughout the episode on Monday when he said he had a “good relationship” with Trump. The former president clarified that he appreciates the way McCarthy will make the extra effort to stay in his favor after accusing Trump of chaos.
Source: Huffpost
