Pete Buttigieg says president ‘considered safety of American people’ but Marco Rubio criticizes eight-day wait
The US transportation secretary, Pete Buttigieg, rejected Republican criticism of Joe Biden over the eight-day wait to shoot down a suspected Chinese spy balloon which flew over military sites.
“The president gave instructions to have it shot down in a way that was safe,” Buttigieg told CNN’s State of the Union, of the operation off the Carolina coast on Saturday.
Associated Press contributed to this report
