Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg on Sunday defended President Biden’s dealing with of the Chinese secret agent balloon that flew around the United States over the process a number of days prior to the U.S. army shot it down Saturday, pronouncing it used to be “handled appropriately.”
“As the U.S has communicated, it’s not acceptable at all that China sent this object into our airspace, but in terms of how to handle it, that’s something that was done based on assessment of the risks, making sure that there was no risk that outweighed the risks in terms of any damage that would come and it was handled appropriately,” Buttigieg stated on CNN’s “State of the Union.”
He would move directly to reward the project to shoot down the Chinese secret agent balloon as being achieved in a “very effective” and “excellent” manner.
Host Jake Tapper later pressed Buttigieg on when Biden first discovered that the Chinese secret agent balloon entered U.S. airspace, prompting him to mention, “I really can’t speak to that.”
US MILITARY SHOOTS DOWN CHINESE SPY BALLOON OVER ATLANTIC OCEAN
Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg defended the Biden management’s dealing with of a Chinese secret agent balloon. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File)
(AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File)
“What I can speak to is the great cooperation we have between the FAA and the Pentagon to make sure we that when you have a special military operation like what it took to bring down this balloon, that it happens without any threat to American lives and property,” Buttigieg said.
Buttigieg’s feedback come an afternoon after U.S. army fighter jets shot down the balloon off the coast of South Carolina. A senior U.S. army legitimate stated that an F-22 used to be used to carry down the balloon at 58,000 ft, including {that a} unmarried A9X missile used to be fired.
Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III stated in a remark after the balloon used to be shot down that “President Biden gave his authorization to take down the surveillance balloon as soon as the mission could be accomplished without undue risk to American lives under the balloon’s path.”
Despite the balloon being shot down, Biden gained backlash from Republicans who criticized him for permitting the balloon to fly throughout U.S. airspace for more than one days and now not capturing the balloon down quicker.
REPUBLICAN DEMANDS JOE BIDEN, KAMALA HARRIS RESIGN AFTER ‘CATASTROPHIC CHINESE SPY BALLOON SPECTACLE’
The White House stated on Friday President Joe Biden would now not shoot down the suspected Chinese secret agent balloon, in spite of calls from lawmakers and others.
(Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images/Larry Mayer/The Billings Gazette by the use of AP/Keith Tsuji/Getty Images)
Rep. Joe Wilson, R-S.C., a member of the House Armed Services Committee, stated Saturday that the Chinese secret agent balloon saga showed that each President Biden and Vice President Harris must renounce from place of job.
“The catastrophic Chinese Spy Balloon spectacle clearly threatened American families from Alaska to my home community in South Carolina and confirms President Biden and Vice President Harris should resign,” Wilson stated in a tweet. “My call for their resignation was valid in August 2021 due to the surrender and disastrous withdrawal in Afghanistan, creating a safe haven for terrorists to attack American families.”
Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, echoed Fry’s sentiment pronouncing the balloon “should have been taken out earlier, over remote areas of Alaska or Montana.”
“Not only was the Homeland Security Committee not informed of this CCP provocation before it broke on the news, but it has since come to light that officials were monitoring the balloon before it entered U.S. airspace and could have been shot down over the water before ever reaching our shores,” Republican Rep. Andrew Garbarino, a member of the House Committee on Homeland Security, informed Fox News Digital. “This was the CCP testing their boundaries and President Biden failed in his response.”
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., added that it quantities to “negligence” if the U.S. is not able to recuperate data from the balloon because of the verdict to attend till it used to be over the sea. Nevertheless, Graham stated the eventual choice to take it down used to be a “sound decision.”
CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP
In a remark to Fox News Digital, Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., stated that Biden “abysmally failed” a take a look at at the international level.
“The Chinese Communist spy balloon should never have been allowed to cross into our sovereign nation gathering intelligence,” Stefanik stated. “The American people deserve to know why Joe Biden allowed this national security threat for so long, why he tried to hide it from the American people, and what information our foreign adversaries were gathering.”
Fox News’ Adam Sabes , Jacqui Heinrich, Jennifer Griffin, Andrew Mark Miller, and Thomas Catenacci contributed reporting.
