Republican Orrin Hatch Regrets Comments Defending Trump, Says, 'No One Is Above the Law'

[babylonsister]

Republican Orrin Hatch Regrets Comments Defending Trump, Says, ‘No One Is Above the Law’
By Alexandra Hutzler On 12/14/18 at 3:34 PM


Republican Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah previously defended President Donald Trump amid allegations that he directed a criminal conspiracy over hush money payments doled out before the 2016 election. The retiring lawmaker then said he regretted his past statements and he insisted, “No one is above the law.”

Earlier this week, following the news that federal prosecutors in New York concluded Trump directed his former attorney Michael Cohen to commit campaign finance violations, Hatch told reporters, “I don’t care, all I can say is he’s doing a good job as president.”

“The Democrats will do anything to hurt this president,” he said.

But now, just after giving his farewell address on the Senate floor, Hatch released a statement in which he expressed regret for “speaking imprudently” in his defense of Trump.

“Earlier this week in an unplanned hallway interview with CNN, I made comments about allegations against the President that were irresponsible and a poor reflection on my lengthy record of dedication to the rule of law,” Hatch wrote.

The longtime lawmaker added that while he doesn’t believe that Cohen is “any kind of reliable voice in this process” he expressed “confidence” in special counsel Robert Mueller and his ongoing investigation into Russian election interference.

“I don’t believe the President broke the law, but one of the core principles of our country is that no one is above the law. That means anyone who does break the law should face appropriate consequences,” Hatch concluded.

more...

https://www.newsweek.com/republican-senator-regrets-defending-trump-1259839?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Facebook&utm_campaign=NewsweekFacebookSF&fbclid=IwAR1k1lvfgsN0G0Dj_ffrVCSAHPYwG_ydpYUzRdmtwPvR4sVXD3JkFedtrwk

[TomSlick]

1. Back on his meds?

[hedda_foil]

4. More likely his wife reminded him that he could be destroying his "good name" in history.

[TomSlick]

11. If so, good for her.

If Herself tells me what to do (or not do), I listen. She's smarter than I.

[Qutzupalotl]

2. At least he took his comments back.

That’s more than Trump cultists can do. Not a high bar, I know.

The comments were truly deplorable. Hatch was once a little more moderate, though still far right. He has now become hyperpartisan, and that is sad for all of us.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

9. revise and extend

After over 4 decades of being able to "revise and extend" his remarks for the record, he thinks it applies to the Internet. He wants to gain the favor of those who agree with his first remarks, then revise them to gain favor with everyone else. Naturally, he wants history to remember only the final revision.

Double dipping is bad form.

[Bleacher Creature]

3. He only regrets saying it out loud. NT

[AZ8theist]

5. did he put on his imaginary glasses to read the statement??

[Squinch]

6. LOL. If even that rat distancing himself, that ship is truly sinking.

[CentralMass]

7. Here is a good article about the scumbag

https://www.thenation.com/article/orrin-hatch-was-never-a-public-servant/
Orrin Hatch Was Never a ‘Public Servant'

Orrin Hatch referred last year to his long Senate tenure as “my whole stinking career.”
"That was a fair assessment of the Utah Republican’s 41 years in Washington.

Seventy-five percent of Utah voters told pollsters last fall that they did not want the senator to seek reelection in 2018.
Hatch helped usher in the era of relentlessly negative and dishonest politics.

Hatch took the hint this week, announcing that he plans to retire after four decades of placing special interests and the personal power that is obtained by serving them above the public interest and the people whose lives are made dramatically worse when government abandons them.

Few, aside from President Trump, Republican majority leader Mitch McConnell, and the lobbyists for the special interests Hatch served, will miss one of the most egregious hypocrites ever to serve in a chamber where mendacity has always been well represented.

Hatch was elected to the Senate in 1976, after running a campaign that anticipated the crudely divisive strategies and relentless negativity that have come to characterize contemporary campaigning. Hatch was a pioneering practitioner of the new politics of shameless pretense that would come to define Washington. A Republican who had moved to Utah from Pennsylvania, he claimed that the incumbent Democratic senator, who had been born and raised in Utah, was out of touch with the values and the concerns of the state.

That was a fantasy developed by the political con artists who had the malleable newcomer run on the issue of term limits. Hatch made a joke of incumbent Frank Moss’s three terms of honorable service in the Senate: “What do you call a senator who’s served in office for 18 years? You call him home.” And Hatch promised not to serve for too long in Washington:

Much more at the link

[Hermit-The-Prog]

10. thanks for the link!

[Dave Starsky]

8. Silencio, old man.

You declared your allegiances back when you you were relevant. Now kindly STFU.