Lawmaker Says He Also Did the 'Bad Thing' Gallagher Did

Rep. Duncan Hunter has argued for pardoning Navy SEAL chief Edward Gallagher, who faces charges including murder for a stabbing death in Iraq in 2017. Hunter added a new defense of Gallagher at an event Saturday in California. "Eddie did one bad thing that I’m guilty of too—taking a picture of the body and saying something stupid," Hunter said, per the Times of San Diego. Hunter is a Marine veteran who was deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan. He told the audience that although he didn't text or post the photos anywhere, he took photos "just like that," adding that "a lot of my peers … have done the exact same thing." One of the accusations against Gallagher is that he sent a picture of a dead 15-year-old ISIS fighter to another SEAL, texting, "Good story behind this, got him with my hunting knife."

Hunter told the gathering, a forum on border issues, that he wants President Trump to pardon Gallagher. But the California Republican also said that he'd like the court-martial to be held to show Americans "how disgusting the military justice system is when it's run by lawyers and bureaucrats [who] go after the war-fighter." Hunter wrote an oped for USA Today last week saying that Gallagher would not receive a fair trial and that a pardon "is fully warranted." (More Duncan Hunter stories.)