Sen. John McCain, R-AZ, conceded Sunday that he went too far when he compared President Obama’s handshake with Cuban leader Raul Castro to one between former British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain and Adolf Hitler.
The 77-year-old senator told Candy Crowley on CNN’s “State of the Union” that his original comments were a “gross exaggeration” of reality and were “over the top.”
McCain said Tuesday in an interview with Public Radio International that the handshake between Obama and Castro would be a boon for Cuba’s “dictatorial brutal regime” and then harkened back to the precipitating events of WWII.
As msnbc’s Benjy Sarlin wrote Tuesday, McCain has greeted multiple leaders with checkered human rights records in the name of diplomacy and decorum.
Before brushing off further inquiries from Crowley over the comparison, McCain said, “I don’t think you should shake hands with someone who continues to violate his own country’s human rights,” he said. “It happened but it is what it is.”
Meredith Clark
Meredith Clark is a freelance writer and editor. She was previously a senior news producer for "Patriot Act with Hasan Minhaj," a reporter with MSNBC.com, the digital politics and culture editor at Glamour and a senior news and politics editor at Refinery29. She has written for Vulture, Rolling Stone, Self, Marie Claire, Cosmopolitan, The Daily Beast and Bustle.