White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders slammed Democrats on Wednesday for showing "the purest form of hypocrisy" over James Comey's firing by President Trump, adding that Hillary Clinton would have terminated the FBI director "immediately" if she were elected president.
"Thank God she didn't win," Sanders added.
A reporter at Wednesday's White House press briefing laid out the Trump administration's ambitious domestic agenda and asked Sanders how the White House could hope to bridge the political divide widened by Comey's firing a day earlier.
"Frankly, I'm surprised that it did create a divide since you've had so many Republicans and Democrats repeatedly calling for Director Comey to be gone," Sanders said. "Frankly, I don't think it matters what this president says. You're going to have Democrats come out and fight him every single step of the way."
Sanders called the partisanship one of Washington's problems and why the "swamp" has to be drained further.
She was then asked if Trump had anticipated the Democratic backlash to the firing.
"How could he have, considering the fact that most of the people that are declaring war today were the very ones that were begging for Director Comey to be fired?" Sanders asked. "If Hillary Clinton had won the election—which thank God she didn't—but if she had and she had been in the same position, she would have fired Comey immediately, and the very Democrats that are criticizing the president today would be dancing in the streets celebrating. So I think it's the purest form of hypocrisy."
Comey came under fierce criticism from Democrats for his handling of the Clinton email investigation, particularly for his late-October letter to Congress revealing that emails connected to the investigation had been discovered in a separate probe. Clinton has blamed Comey for causing her to lose the election.
Sen. Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) said in November he had "no confidence" in Comey, but he slammed the firing on Tuesday. He and other Democrats expressed alarm at the dismissal due to Comey's role in the investigation of alleged collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia in 2016. Some Republicans also expressed concern.