Obama White House Defends #Bergdahl Prisoner Exchange

At the New York Times, "Administration Defends Swap With Taliban to Free U.S. Soldier":

WASHINGTON — Top Obama administration officials pushed back on Sunday against Republican criticism that a deal freeing the last American held prisoner in Afghanistan could allow dangerous Taliban leaders to return to the fight, might encourage terrorist groups to seize American hostages and possibly violated a law requiring notification of Congress.

Susan E. Rice, the president’s national security adviser, spoke a day after years of fitful negotiations had finally yielded the release in Afghanistan of the prisoner, Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl. The deal, brokered with Qatari help, also freed five high-level Taliban members from the prison camp at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.

The release of the Taliban officials was sharply assailed by Republicans, including Representative Mike Rogers of Michigan, chairman of the intelligence committee, as a dangerous transgression of longstanding policy against negotiating with terror groups.

“If you negotiate here, you’ve sent a message to every Al Qaeda group in the world — by the way, some who are holding U.S. hostages today — that there is some value now in that hostage in a way that they didn’t have before,” Mr. Rogers said on the CNN program “State of the Union.” He added, “That is dangerous.”

More.

Susan Rice at ABC News is here, "Ambassador Susan Rice on Release of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl."

And previously, "Rep. Mike Rogers on #Bergdahl: 'We Have Now Set a Price' on American Lives (VIDEO)."