From the March 25 edition of Fox News' Fox & Friends:
Fox's Huckabee calls Trump/Russia investigation an “attempted coup d'etat” and demands Republicans investigate the Justice Department and FBI
Written by Media Matters Staff
Published
AINSLEY EARHARDT (CO-HOST): What do the findings mean for President Trump in 2020?
STEVE DOOCY (CO-HOST): Let's talk to Fox News contributor and former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee who joins us today from down in Florida. Mike, OK, so as soon as the report came out and the president has been exonerated, in his words. You didn't expect the Democrats to say, you know what? We were wrong.
MIKE HUCKABEE (FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR): I honestly thought that they would have the good sense to just shut their pie holes after all this came out, but they didn't. And here's the thing we need to remember. There's three things I think have to be put in context. Number one, there was a conspiracy, apparently, a cover-up, and an attempted coup d'etat. But it was not by anyone on the Donald Trump campaign, it was by people inside the government who tried to upend this president and overturn the election. That's serious, it absolutely demands an investigation and charges if they find evidence. Second thing; For all this time we were told Donald Trump didn't even want to be president. That he really didn't run because he thought he would win or wanted to win. He didn't want to win. He just wanted to increase his brand. Now let me ask you something. If he didn't want to win, why would he have ever even conspired with the Russians to begin with? He would have done everything he could do to make sure he didn't win. Now they're saying, well, he colluded with Russians so he could win but he didn't really want to win. You can't have it both way, Democrats and media. And the third thing I think is important; Who was in charge of the government when all these things happened? Who was running the government --
BRIAN KILMEADE (CO-HOST): President Obama.
HUCKABEE: Prior to the election. It was not Donald Trump, it was not Corey Lewandowski, it was not Paul Manafort. It was none of these people. It was Barack Obama, Susan Rice. It was James Clapper, John Brennan. It was Jim Comey, Andrew McCabe, Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, Bruce Ohr. They were the ones in government. Donald Trump had zero power. Why aren't we hearing the fact that when everything happened, the supposed Russia collusion, these were the people who were supposed to be protecting America and they were asleep at the switch. And if it happened, it happened because they let it happen. And they weren't competent enough to stop it.
...
HUCKABEE: Well, something that one of my political mentors, Dick Morris, taught me early in my political life was this: Don't throw the first punch, but once you're punched, counter punch and counter punch hard. What we need to do as Republicans is let them punch, and then counter punch. And open the investigations. Remember, we have the executive branch and the Senate. All they've got is the House. Punch hard. Let Lindsey Graham and the Senate Judiciary Committee go after -- who were the conspirators? Who were the ones who, inside the Department of Justice and FBI, actually conspired to bring down this president? And chase them to justice. Order the attorney general to do the same thing.
Previously:
Fox's Mike Huckabee: FBI staged “what is no less than a coup d'etat against the elected president”
Mike Huckabee suggests Republicans order Capitol police to conduct a raid on the FBI