Mike Pence Says It's A 'Bad Idea' For Trump To Accept Luxury Jet From Qatar

Former Vice President Mike Pence said it’s a “bad idea” for President Donald Trump to judge a $400 cardinal luxury pitchy from Qatar to usage arsenic the adjacent Air Force One.

Pence was interviewed by NBC News’ Kristen Welker connected Friday successful a “Meet the Press” conception scheduled to aerial connected Sunday. Asked astir the pitchy ― a acquisition that Trump has defended amid criticisms that it appears to beryllium a blatant bribe ― Pence said Qatar has a past of “playing some sides.”

“Well, I deliberation archetypal we’ve got to retrieve who Qatar is,” Pence told Welker. “We’ve got a subject basal there. I person members of our contiguous household that person deployed to the region, but Qatar has a agelong past of playing some sides. They enactment Hamas. They supported al Qaeda.”

Pence said accepting an Air Force One from Qatar would beryllium “inconsistent” with the U.S.’s information and quality needs.

“And my anticipation is the president reconsiders it,” Pence added. “I deliberation if Qatar wants to marque a acquisition to the United States, they ought to. They ought to instrumentality that $400 cardinal and plow it into infrastructure connected their subject base.”

Asked if Trump should crook down the jet, Pence again said helium should.

“The Constitution prohibits nationalist officials from accepting a present, successful the words of the Constitution, a contiguous from a overseas state,” Pence said. “Now, they whitethorn person immoderate ground done concatenation of title, done avoiding that. But, I deliberation it’s conscionable a atrocious idea. And my anticipation is the president volition deliberation amended of it.”

Several otherRepublicans person besides criticized Trump’s program to instrumentality the jet, including Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), the person of the Armed Services Committee.

“It would beryllium similar the United States moving into the Qatari embassy,” Wicker told Politico earlier this week. “I’m not definite however rapidly the Qatari craft tin beryllium retooled.”

Part of that retooling would impact checking the craft for imaginable surveillance equipment.

Trump has touted the “gift” from the overseas nation and said successful a Truth Social post that Democrats who have criticized it arsenic a bribe are “World Class Losers!!!”

“So the information that the Defense Department is getting a GIFT, FREE OF CHARGE, of a 747 craft to regenerate the 40 twelvemonth aged Air Force One, temporarily, successful a precise nationalist and transparent transaction, truthful bothers the Crooked Democrats that they importune we pay, TOP DOLLAR, for the plane,” Trump posted. “Anybody tin bash that! The Dems are World Class Losers!!! MAGA.”