Pentagon: It Was Obama Camp's "Decision To Cancel" Visit to Troops
(CBS)
(BERLIN,GERMANY) UPDATE, 1:30pm ET Barack Obama spent the morning working in his room at Berlin's Adelon Hotel after the campaign canceled a planned visit to Ramstein Airbase and Landstuhl Regional Medical Center. Late last night, the campaign canceled the planned troop visit because they said they did not want to politicize the meeting.
Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell told CBS News today, "The senator is more than welcome to visit any military facility, he always has been and always will be, as a senator."
"The Pentagon was willing to accomodate the fact they were on a campaign trip," Morrell added, saying that the Pentagon would have kept the campaign staff and traveling press outside while Obama was inside visiting the troops.
"It was their decision to cancel the visit," Morrell said.
On today's flight from Berlin to Paris, Obama campaign communications director Robert Gibbs tried to clarify why the meeting at Ramstein was canceled. "He could go as a United States Senator, but it was pretty clear from the guidance that we received from the Pentagon that the trip would be viewed as a campaign stop. Given the info that we had received, Senator Obama made the decision that we were not going have wounded men and women become involved in a campaign trip."
Initially, Gibbs said Obama thought it would be "inappropriate" to visit troops on a visit funded by the campaign. The troop meetings in Afghanistan and Iraq were part of a congressional delegation trip, not paid for by the campaign.
This morning, senior adviser Gen. Scott Gration shifted the blame to the Pentagon, saying they advised the campaign against the visit.
"We learned from the Pentagon last night that the visit would be viewed instead as a campaign event," Gration said. "Senator Obama did not want to have a trip to see our wounded warriors percieved as a campaign event when his visit was to show his appreciation for our troops and decided instead not to go.” Gration is currently traveling with the campaign.
After the cancellation was announced yesterday, a McCain spokesman hammered Obama in a written statement: “Barack Obama is wrong. It is never ‘inappropriate’ to visit our men and women in the military.”
Gibbs responded to the criticism this morning saying, "We might have gotten criticism for going, we have been critcized for not going."
CBS News' Steve Chaggaris contributed to this report.
