'I am not the national security decision-maker. That's his view,' said National Security Adviser John Bolton, referring to President Donald Trump.
North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un and President Donald Trump talk in the garden of the Metropole hotel during the second North Korea-US summit in Hanoi, Vietnam, on February 28, 2019.National Security Adviser John Bolton struggled to defend President Donald Trump after he took North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's"word" on the death of US student Otto Warmbier.
"My opinion doesn't matter," Bolton said to CNN's Jake Tapper when asked if he trusted the North Korean leader on his account.but has claimed he was"misinterpreted." National Security Adviser John Bolton on Sunday said his"opinion doesn't matter" when pressed over whether heAppearing on CNN's"State of the Union," Bolton told host Jake Tapper,"The President takes [Kim] at his word."Tapper then pushed Bolton on whether he also takes the North Korean leader's word. Bolton replied,"My opinion doesn't matter.
"When he says 'I'm going to take him at his word,' it doesn't mean he accepts it as reality. It means he accepts that's what Kim said,"As Trump met with Kim in Hanoi last week to continue discussions on denuclearization, he told reporters that he'd confronted the North Korean leader about Warmbier's death.
Warmbier was arrested in North Korea in January 2016 for allegedly stealing a propaganda poster and sentenced to 15 years of hard labor. He was released back to the US after 17 months in detention but was in a vegetative state and died soon after.
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