White House press secretary Josh Earnest mocked Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz Friday for his tweets regarding the Obama administration's handling of the Islamic State, critiquing the Texas senator for lacking a specific national security policy.
Earnest announced that President Barack Obama will be at the Pentagon Monday to meet with his national security team and then make remarks about the fight against the Islamic State. After reporter questions, Earnest insisted the administration would maintain it's current course in the fight.
"Those who are most frequent in voicing those calls, do not themselves have alternative solutions on the table," Earnest said. "Just to cite one example, I know that after the president issued his address to the nation from the Oval Office that Senator Cruz, in the thoughtful medium known as Twitter, suggested, if he were president of the United States, he would order the Department of Defense to destroy ISIL."
Earnest stressed that is already Obama's policy.
Republican presidential candidate Sen. Ted Cruz (Texas) speaks at the Heritage Foundation Thursday in Washington, D.C. Sen. Cruz spoke on "Securing America's Freedom: Protect, Defend, and Champion American Liberties Through a Strong National Defense." (Alex Wong/Getty Images)
"This, of course, is the mandate the president has given for our entire national security team and all of our allies and partners in the coalition since September of 2014," Earnest said. "It’s a pretty good illustration that we hear a lot of rhetoric — and in some cases, even outrageous claims — but not a lot of tangible or specific or realistic."
With a 140-character limit, Cruz unpacked his criticism of Obama's prime-time Sunday address into three separate tweets. The first saying he would order the destruction of the Islamic State, the second that he would fix the broken immigration system and the third saying that Obama addressed neither in his prime time speech.
If I am elected President, I will direct the Department of Defense to destroy ISIS: https://t.co/am6Sxe3anE
— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) December 7, 2015And I will shut down the broken immigration system that is letting jihadists into our country. https://t.co/CpjCljVN5H
— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) December 7, 2015Nothing President Obama said tonight will assist in either case. https://t.co/gxppI9rQvU
— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) December 7, 2015
