'Objectively not true, Jake': MAGA senator bristles when pressed by CNN's Tapper

A MAGA senator sparred with CNN anchor Jake Tapper on Thursday afternoon during a grilling over Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth insisting the Pentagon doesn't have to "respect a court ruling."

Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-OH) joined Tapper's show "The Lead" and was asked to react to Hegseth's comments to lawmakers after Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) asked whether Hegseth would respect court rulings on U.S. service members being used to intervene in Los Angeles protests.

"Can you assure the American people of two things — that you will respect any Supreme Court decision on this matter about whether the Marines are constitutional, and that you will respect the district courts when they rule before the Supreme Court rules?" asked Khanna

Hegseth replied that what he "can say" is that "we should not have local judges determining foreign policy or national security policy for the country."

"So you're not willing to say you would respect those decisions?" Khanna shot back.

But Hegseth held firm.

"What I’m saying is, local district judges shouldn’t make foreign policy for the United States," he insisted.

When pressed on the comments, Moreno took issue with Tapper's framing of Hegseth's remarks.

"Senator, what’s your reaction to that? Do you have any concerns about Secretary Hegseth setting this precedent — that the Pentagon does not have to respect a court ruling?" asked Tapper.

"Well, that’s just objectively not true, Jake. That’s not what he said," Moreno retorted.

Moreno said the Trump administration has "followed every court ruling, by the way, even including the ridiculous one where we had to bring back an El Salvadoran citizen who is a criminal alien, convicted of awful crimes, who shouldn’t have been in this country in the first place."

"And we literally had to bring him back to the U.S. from El Salvador to tie up our court system, to prove what we already know, what he’d already gone through, which is that he shouldn’t be in this country," Moreno added, referring to Kilmar Abrego Garcia.

Tapper, furrowing his eyebrows, immediately asked what crimes the migrant was convicted of.

"He came into this country illegally. Right?" Moreno said, ducking the question.

The two slightly talked over one another as Tapper noted the main issue with the deportation in question was that a judge said the migrant couldn’t be deported back to El Salvador.

But Moreno doubled down on his case.

"So now think about how insane that is. We’re using taxpayer dollars to bring an El Salvadoran citizen back to the U.S., only to deport him to one of another hundred countries. This is insane, Jake," he said.

Watch the full clip below or at this link.