Donald Trump faced a fresh backlash after accepting that Vladimir Putin was “a killer” - while claiming the US operated in much the same way.
In a taped interview broadcast before the Super Bowl, the US President said he wanted a better relationship with Moscow.
Asked by Fox News host Bill O'Reilly about Mr Putin being a “killer” in a country where opposition figures and journalists have been slain, Mr Trump conceded the point.
But he said: “There are a lot of killers. We've got a lot of killers.
“What do you think? Our country's so innocent?"
Referencing the Iraq war, he went on: “Take a look at what we've done, too. We've made a lot of mistakes.”
The comments caused a storm with senior Republican in the Senate, with majority leader Mitch McConnell, saying: “Putin's a former KGB agent. He's a thug.
“He was not elected in a way that most people would consider a credible election.”
“The Russians annexed Crimea, invaded Ukraine and messed around in our elections,” he said.
“And no, I don't think there's any equivalency between the way the Russians conduct themselves and the way the United States does."
Republican Senator Ben Sasse, of Nebraska, said: "There is no moral equivalency between the United States of America, the greatest freedom living nation in the history of the world, and the murderous thugs that are in Putin's defence of his cronyism.“
Florida senator Marco Rubio, a Republican who has been a vocal critic of Mr Trump, tweeted: "When has a Democratic political activist been poisoned by the GOP, or vice versa? We are not the same as Putin.”
