WASHINGTON — President Trump, welcoming an American clergyman on his return to the U.S. after a two-year imprisonment in Turkey, took credit for his release and blamed President Obama for not getting him out sooner.
“For Andrew, it’s been a very interesting day,” Trump told reporters who were called to the White House to witness the repatriation of Andrew Brunson, an evangelical Presbyterian from North Carolina. “From a Turkish prison to the White House in 24 hours. That’s not bad.”
Brunson, who had been living and preaching in Turkey for more than two decades, was arrested October 2016 on suspicion of involvement in a coup attempt against the country’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan. His case became a cause celebre among American evangelicals, sparking tensions between the U.S. and Turkey, a NATO member, as the Trump administration maintained Brunson’s innocence and pushed for his freedom.
A Turkish court found Brunson guilty on Friday of charges that could have led to a sentence of up to 35 years, but immediately released him for time served. Brunson was quickly flown to the U.S. on a government plane.
In the Oval Office on Saturday, Trump touted Brunson’s return as evidence of his strong handling of the cases of Americans detained abroad.
“We’ve been negotiating long and hard. We do not pay ransom in this country — at least any longer. We don’t pay ransom otherwise you have big problems and lots of things will happen, lots of bad things will happen. But I still—I want to thank President Erdogan,” Trump said.
Trump repeatedly said he dealt with the situation better than his predecessor, President Barack Obama, would have.
“It started in a different administration, and they were not going to work out anything, and we took it over. We inherited it and we have, I think at this moment, gotten 19 people out of various countries that were being held,” said Trump.
Trump cited the cases of three American detainees freed from North Korea in May and the case of Aya Hijazi, an American citizen who was released from Egypt in April 2017.
“Aya was, they said, a spy. She was sentenced to 25 years. They told President Obama, ‘We will not let her out under any circumstances.’ And they told me, ‘She’ll be in the Oval Office in 24 hours,’” Trump said.
