Citing the “lies” that ignited the war in Iraq, presidential candidate Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI) would not answer whether she believed Syrian President Bashar Assad is a war criminal, nor if she would believe the findings of of her own intelligence community if elected president.
“I think that the evidence needs to be gathered, and as I have said before, if there is evidence that he has committed war crimes, he should be prosecuted as such,” she said.
Gabbard made the remarks during a CNN town hall discussion on Sunday, furthering bipartisan concern that the congresswoman is sympathetic to the Assad regime. Two years ago, Gabbard made an unannounced visit to Assad and has said in the past that she is “skeptical” that he was behind a chemical weapon attack against his own people in 2017. The United Nations and the U.S. Department of Defense have both concluded that Assad was responsible for the massacre.
“I served in a war in Iraq — a war that was launched based on lies, and a war that was launched without evidence. And so the American people were duped,” Gabbard said. “So as a soldier, as an American, as a member of Congress, it is my duty and my responsibility to exercise skepticism any time anyone tries to send our service members into harm’s way or use our military to go in and start a new war.”
