The president taking it down over the Atlantic Ocean is kind of like tackling the quarterback after the game is over. The Republican Rep. Mike Turner, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, led a chorus of critics accusing President Joe Biden of waiting too long to take down a suspected Chinese spy balloon that spent days flying over U.S. airspace.
The morning after Biden ordered a U.S. Air Force fighter to shoot down the balloon off the Carolina coast, Republicans included Turner, Sen. Ted Cruz and Sen. Marco Rubio were making rounds on Sunday morning talk shows to criticize what they described as the administration's lack of urgency over national security.
Turner said on Sunday that the balloon should never have been allowed to enter the U.S. and that it should never have been allowed to complete its mission. He said that this administration lacks urgency.
Cruz made similar statements on Face the Nation on Sunday, saying Biden gave the Chinese a full week to conduct spying operations over the U.S. over sensitive military installations. The Texas Republican said that the entire episode telegraphed weakness to Chinese President Xi Jinping.
Both Turner and Cruz called the Biden administration out for not telling the American public about the suspected spy balloon until after media outlets broke the story.
Florida Republican Rubio also suggested that the message the Biden balloon response sent to the world was, These guys the U.S. can't even do anything about a balloon flying over U.S. airspace? How can I count on them if something happens in the Indo-Pacific region? How can they help Taiwan? The Department of Defense also revealed that Chinese balloons briefly crossed over the continental U.S. at least three times during the Trump administration, as Democrat Sen. Cory Booker, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, while defending Biden later on Meet the Press.
The New Jersey lawmaker said that this is now known that it has happened several times under the Trump administration. It is a bit hypocritical to create another standard for Biden. The Department of Defense said on January 28 that the balloon and its payload were first detected by U.S. officials in the United States, before it entered U.S. airspace near the Aleutian Islands, before traveling over Alaska and Canada, and then entering U.S. airspace over Idaho.
Biden said on Saturday that he had ordered U.S. officials to shoot down the suspected surveillance balloon earlier this week, and that national security leaders had decided the best time for the operation was once it was over water.
The DoD stated that while the balloon was an unacceptable violation of U.S. sovereignty, it did not pose a military or physical threat. The report said Chinese balloons briefly transited the continental U.S. at least three times during the previous administration, as in under President Donald Trump's watch.
That was something that appeared to catch Rubio off-guard at the end of his interview.
Biden is facing a new challenge as he prepares to give his second State of the Union address on Tuesday, where he is expected to discuss the debt-limit standoff, economic worries, and acts of violence at home and abroad.