Idaho senator defends Trump and his 'ability to declassify anything at any time'

Sen. Jim Risch.
(Image credit: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

President Trump has at least one senator standing behind him following The Washington Post's report that he gave highly classified information not meant to be shared to Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak during a meeting last week.

Sen. Jim Risch (R-Idaho) had no issue with Trump possibly giving out sensitive information to representatives of a foreign country accused of interfering with the 2016 presidential election, telling Alice Ollstein of Talking Points Memo that the president "has the ability to declassify anything at any time without any process. So it's no longer classified the minute he utters it." While the president does have the right as commander in chief to do this, "any president needs to be careful," Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up
Explore More
Catherine Garcia, The Week US

Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.