The Biden administration's prisoner swap of Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout for WNBA star Brittney Griner "sets a dangerous precedent" that will make the United States look weaker on the world stage, much like the withdrawal from Afghanistan, Sen. James Lankford told Newsmax on Wednesday.
"The world stage will look at the United States and say, They used to be strong. They used to be powerful negotiators. They are no longer that," the Oklahoma Republican said on Newsmax's "Wake Up America." "There's no one in the world in any country that's going to look at this exchange and say that was a great exchange for the Americans.
"They're going to say the Americans look weak."
Lankford also said it puts any American in countries like North Korea, Russia, Iran, China, or Venezuela "at great risk because they can be scooped up at any point and then be held for any political prisoner those countries want."
Meanwhile, the truth will come out about why Griner was traded and not Paul Whelan, who has been held in Russia for four years on espionage charges, but the bigger issue is why Bout, the so-called "merchant of death" was chosen for release, said Lankford.
"You've got DEA agents, you've got federal officials who risked their lives to be able to go arrest this person who was deliberately trying to be able to target Americans and to be able to kill them," said Lankford, adding that Bout, an international arms dealer, will help Russia obtain arms to use against Ukraine.
"This is an absurd trade that should never even have been on the table in the first place," Lankford said.
Lankford on Wednesday also talked about Sen. Kyrsten Sinema's decision to switch party affiliations from Democrat to independent and said he does not blame the Arizona lawmaker for saying she no longer wanted to be part of the Democratic Party.
"She's always been very independent," Lankford said. "She votes more consistently on the left, by far, but she's also been a person who has been very outspoken."
Lankford further discussed President Joe Biden's signing of the Respect for Marriage Act, noting that while it allows churches to perform same-sex marriages, it also opens up the possiblity of lawsuits.
"If you work with a nonprofit or a company that partners with the government in any way, then same-sex couples could sue you and say they were harmed by you if you disagree with them on the issue of same-sex marriage," said Lankford.
"This is going to unleash a flurry of lawsuits all over the country to try to silence anyone who disagrees for religious reasons or any other conscience reasons with same-sex marriage, with maybe a church's tax-exempt status on the line."
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Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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