Sen. Jeff Flake: Republicans Should Have Stood Up Against The "Birther" Movement

GOP Sen. Jeff Flake of Arizona

Republican Sen. Jeff Flake, out hawking his new book, appeared on NBC's Meet The Press this morning demonstrating a new found sense of political courage.

Speaking to host Chuck Todd, Flake shared that he wished more GOP folks had opposed some of the uglier incidents in recent politics, like Donald Trump's "birther" conspiracy which claimed President Obama was not born in the United States.

“Well, I do think that we’ve seen more people ready to stand up. And I wish that we, as a party, would have stood up, for example, when the birtherism thing was going along. A lot of people did stand up but not enough,” said Flake.

Flake also now denounces the calls of "lock her up"  regarding Hillary Clinton at Trump campaign rallies last year.

It's nice to look reasonable now, but where was this sense of political ethics last year?

Watch Flake explain himself to Todd below.

Sen. @jeffflake (R-Ariz.) tells @chucktodd in an exclusive interview, "I wish we as a party had stood up" to the birther movement. #MTP pic.twitter.com/LfIABvICFj

— Meet the Press (@MeetThePress) August 6, 2017

(h/t JoeMyGod)