As the fallout over former President Donald Trump’s possibly illegal hoarding of classified documents continues to reverberate around the country, an ally of the ex-president from the Senate admitted that the material should have been turned over to the National Archives when they first requested them.

Sen. Roy Blunt (R-MO) was asked Sunday on “This Week” by host George Stephanopoulos:

“Setting that aside, whether or not these documents were classified, was it right for the president to take these government documents, which he’s supposed to turn over to the National Archives, down to Mar-a-Lago?”

Blunt replied:

“You should be very careful with classified documents. I’ve had access to documents like that for a long time. I’m incredibly careful.”

But when the senator began to take a sidestep and suggest that Hillary Clinton and former FBI Director James Comey may have improperly handled classified documents, Stephanopoulos cut him off and asked again:

“Senator, you’re still not answering.You’re not answering the question. You’re critical of Sen. Clinton, who actually turned over what she had, turned over all her devices. What we have here is a situation where the president did not turn over these documents.

“Can you say whether that was right or wrong? Do you believe it was right for the president to take those documents to Mar-a-Lago?”

Blunt admitted:

“He should have turned the documents over, and apparently had turned a number of documents over.”

In the next breath, however, the senator tried to suggest that the FBI search of Trump’s Palm Beach resort might have been political, coming as it did just 100 days of the midterm elections, which led Stephanopoulos to remind Blunt:

“It went on because the president didn’t turn over the documents, correct? He was asked several times. He didn’t turn them over. He was subpoenaed. He didn’t respond to the subpoena.”

That led to another bogus defense of Trump’s actions from Blunt:

“I understand that he turned over a lot of documents. He should have turned over all of them. I imagine he knows that very well now as well.”

Once again, Stephanopoulos fact-checked the senator:

“Well, he hasn’t said that. He said he did nothing wrong.”