House Homeland Committee Chairman Michael McCaul (R-TX) said Thursday he would have responded differently than former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) to a question about authorizing an invasion of Iraq given the information available today.
“You think he would be prepared for that question,” McCaul said at a Christian Science Monitor Breakfast. “But I would have answered it differently.”
McCaul went on to argue that the real question is not really about invading Iraq today given the information available.
“I think the question is: you can’t change the past. You can try to learn from the past but you can’t changed what happened. The question is how you deal with Iraq in the present?” McCaul said. “I would have had a Status of Forces agreement. That was a mistake too. We had bad intelligence, that was a mistake as well. But dealing with it today, how are you going to stabilize that region? Can we afford to leave it destabilized?”
The Homeland Security Committee chairman did not, however, give a straight answer on whether he would authorize an invasion given the information available now.
McCaul’s comments come after a week where Bush was in the national spotlight for his comments on Iraq; first saying that he would have authorized an invasion given the information available today, then that he misheard the question, and finally that he would not have authorized an invasion.
Other declared and likely 2016 presidential candidates pounced on Bush. Most of the field said they would not have authorized an invasion, contrary to Bush’s initial comment. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) jabbed Bush for not answering the question “simply and directly.”
Photo credit: Michael Bonfigli/The Christian Science Monitor