President Donald Trump made the right move to reposition two nuclear-capable subs near Russia in response to comments made by former Russian President Dmitry Medevev, former GOP Reps. Pete King and Jack Kingston agreed on Newsmax on Sunday.
"This is a type of foreign policy that's long overdue, King, of New York, told Newsmax's "Wake Up America Weekend." "We can't be constantly backing off, constantly trying to be conciliatory if Russia is threatening us, even implicitly, with some sort of nuclear attack or threat."
He pointed out that Trump ordered the bombing of Iran's nuclear sites, a move that had been under discussion for "20 years."
"People were talking about that, thinking it would never really be done, and he did it overnight and it worked," said King, adding that he believes Russian President Vladimir Putin is seeing that Trump is "not going to take any nonsense."
"This, to me, is a great, great foreign policy step," he added.
Meanwhile, Kingston, of Georgia, pointed out that the U.S. has 71 submarines, and "they're all nuclear now."
"Some of them are missile-guided, some of them are ballistic," he said. "I happen to have the honor of representing Kings Bay Naval Base [in St. Marys, Georgia], where the Ohio-class subs are, and I can tell you, they roamed the globe constantly."
Kingston added that Trump, back in 2017, carried out the same action on the South Korean peninsula and as a result, de-escalated some of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's rhetoric.
"It set up a conversation between the two of them, and we had four years of peace because of this," he said. "So I think what the president is doing is prudent and appropriate."
The former lawmakers also discussed Trump's firing of Bureau of Labor Statistics Commissioner Erika McEntarfer, an appointee of former President Joe Biden, after data showed employment growth was weaker than expected last month.
"I think he fired her because he saw her for being a political hack," said Kingston. "There are so many stats that go in there that you can play with the numbers, and you can get the results that you want. When it was helpful to Joe Biden, she had good numbers, and when it's not helpful to Donald Trump, not so good numbers."
King agreed that under Biden, "the Labor Department was playing around with the numbers."
"The fact is, the economy is going in the right direction," he said. "The economy is strong, and whether or not there's a blip up or down in one particular month, I think out there, people can feel it. They know it's stronger, they know things are going well."
Further, more jobs exist for people born in the U.S. than for immigrants, and "that, to me, is the direction we want to go in. That's what President Trump wants to do," said King.
He added the economy is "going in the right direction" and Trump is "getting the job done."
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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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