The Patriot Post® · Cruz on Taliban Release

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) weighed in on the weekend’s prisoner exchange – five high-level Taliban jihadis for U.S. Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl: “Well, look, all of us celebrate with Sergeant Bergdahl, with his family, I mean, looking at his parents there, I mean, that’s emotional and it’s powerful. At the same time the terms of the deal are very troubling. … [H]ow many soldiers lost their lives to capture those five Taliban terrorists that we just released? You know, Ambassador [Susan] Rice basically said to you, yes, U.S. policy has changed. Now we make deals with terrorists. And the question going forward is, have we just put a price on other U.S. soldiers? What does this tell terrorists, that if you capture a U.S. soldier, you can trade that soldier for five terrorists we’ve gone after. … It says the reason why the U.S. has had the policy for decades of not negotiating with terrorists is because once you start doing it, every other terrorist has an incentive to capture more soldiers.”