White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer on Tuesday dismissed former acting Attorney General Sally Yates as President Trump's "political opponent."
Spicer was reacting to a reporter's question at the White House daily press briefing about Yates' testimony on Monday before the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism. He pushed back on Yates' comments addressing the firing of Michael Flynn as Trump's national security adviser.
"Let's look at how this came down," Spicer said. "Someone who is not exactly a supporter of the president's agenda, who a couple days after this first conversation took place, refused to uphold a lawful order of the president's."
He went on to say that Yates was not excited about Trump taking office before getting interrupted by a reporter.
"[Yates] had come here giving a heads-up, told us there were materials, and at the same time we did what we should do," Spicer said. "Just because somebody comes in and gives you a heads-up about something and says, 'I want to share some information,' doesn't mean you immediately jump the gun and go take an action."
Spicer said that if one were to flip the scenario, then the media would argue that it was irrational.
"What if we had just dismissed somebody because a political opponent of the president had made an utterance? You would argue that it was pretty irrational to act from that manner," Spicer said.
Spicer said that Trump made the right decision to fire Yates before a reporter asked Spicer how she could be a "political opponent of the president."
He said Yates was appointed by the Obama administration and that she was "a strong supporter of [Hillary] Clinton."