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Sights in syria punishing the assad regime for the chemical weapons attack on its own people people. here to react this morning we re going to bring in heather nowart nowart. heather, good morning. thanks for being here. first of all, the latest message from the state department on these strikes in syria. well, syria and russia can become responsible members of society. syria can first and foremost avoid further action on the part of the u.s. and its allies by declaring and getting rid of its stockpiles of chemical weapons. we have watched and seen for far too long as bashar al-assad has continued to use chemical weapons on his own people, 500,000 now have been killed since this war started. pete: heather, the previous administration said 100 percent that they d gotten rid of it, the chemicals were out, that russia had helped them do so. did that never happen or russia was supposed to help them do that. russia and syria, by the way, ....
The misery they re causing. pete: and potentially a change in their policy toward iran and the iran deal. another deadline coming up. what is your hedge, heather, this morning to supporters of the president who say we elected him for his america first foreign policy that would mean less involvement in the middle east, yet they see these strikes and entanglements. how do you balance that? i m glad you asked that. look. this is america first. keeping america safe. but america is not safe when there s destabilization across the world. so when you see someone like bashar al-assad acting, there are things that we have to do about this as the united states of america. not only is the morally right thing and not only does the united states and her allies have a responsibility to lead, that s what america does best, but this ultimately keeps america safe as well. griff: heather, you keep mentioning our allies. this is prime minister theresa may s first such action. she did it without the a ....
China, others. what is the message and how does this impact players like north korea? well, i think this is a great example of the world acting together to say you know what? there s this thing called the chemical weapons convention, and with 192 signatories, countries better start complying with that that. that is something that s become very clear to countries around the world. we saw how north korea used chemical weapons to kill kim jong-un s half-brother not that long ago. the united states found them in defiance of that, north korea, that is. and so i think you see the world coming together on that, and of course not long ago we saw that russia had used chemical weapons on our ally, the british, through poisoning of the gentleman and his daughter. so this is something that s really come to the forefront again. and we hope that other countries are watching. we think they re matching. abby: heather, you think about your job every single day and the challenges we face internation ....
Congress, and they seem to be all over the place map. i want to just give you a couple examples. this is chuck schumer who says, appropriate be be careful. lindsey graham says i fear this strike will be seen as a weak military response. justin amash says un unconstitutional, illegal, and reckless. and finally representative massey says i haven t read france s or russia s constitution, but i ve read ourselves, and nowhere does it say presidential authority to strike syria. your response, mixed reactions? a few words about that, article 2 of the constitution, the president has the ability, the authority, and the right to defend american interests. and that s exactly what we were doing. and we were backed by our allies as well. i mean, that has been clear all along. griff: heather, the message that was sent was that president trump is not going to tolerate bullies. and we have seen that under the obama administration s failure to bring syria under wraps, it has emboldened north k ....
Along with 192 other countries are signatories to the chemical weapons convention. that means that countries are not supposed to possess chemical weapons because obviously we can see the deadly results when those weapons are used against people. so russia and syria can stop using those. russia can stop backing bashar al-assad. that needs to happen now in order to avoid further action. and they need to stop attacking their own people in syria. griff: heather, what is your take, then, on russia s response response? clearly the syrian regime got the message loud and clear in the form of 105 missiles, but what is your take on whether the russians are going to get in line now? well, russia needs to do that that. this administration has been holding russia to account from day one. we have had many rounds of sanctions on russia for its meddling in the u.s. elections, for what its done in ukraine and other countries around the world world. also, the united states has imposed sanctions upon r ....