(CNN) Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, a Republican from California, said in a radio interview Thursday that "warmongers" like Sen. Marco Rubio are setting the wrong tone by calling Russian President Vladimir Putin a "war criminal."
In the interview with Breitbart News Radio, Rohrabacher added that there were many examples of US hypocrisy towards Russia on display at the hearing of Donald Trump's secretary of state nominee, Rex Tillerson.
"We have these people claiming that Mr. Putin is war criminal, alright," Rohrabacher told host Raheem Kassam, who asked the congressman if he was referring to Rubio (the Florida senator had asked Tillerson if he believed Putin was a "war criminal").
"He's not the only one doing this," Rohrabacher answered. "But it seems to me like what we've got are warmongers claiming other people are war criminals. This is the wrong kind of tone. That type of rhetoric is leading us to a point where we will be in conflict and the Russians will think that we are out to get them."
The host Kassam then said he was very surprised Tillerson did not challenge "untrue" or hypocritical claims made about Russia during his hearing, like the claim that people who Putin doesn't like disappear in Russia.
"Correct if I'm wrong, people have disappeared in this country under similar auspices with other politicians in the fray, have they not congressman?" asked Kassam.
Rohrabacher did not challenge Kassam's claim, saying there are "many examples" of U.S. hypocrisy towards Russia.
"Well, you can cite so many examples of this," he said. "Look this idea that, McCain I believe said, it's an act of war that they hacked into our system. We hacked into their system all the time. Not just their system, we're hacking into the systems, we're recording telephone conversations of foreign leaders. And we're doing that all the time."