Senator Angus King (I-ME) reacted on Tuesday’s “New Day” on CNN to Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) urging the media to print the Ukraine whistleblower’s name.

King said it is “terrible” and “deeply troubling” to care more about the whistleblower’s identity than the complaint, which he claimed was confirmed in the released transcript.

“It’s deeply troubling and really disappointing,” King told host John Berman. “Number one, the whistleblower’s identity and what they have to say at this point is totally irrelevant to this investigation. It’s like a person seeing smoke coming out of the upstairs windows of the house and they call the fire department. The fire department comes and fights the fire. Who called the fire department doesn’t matter if there’s a real fire.”

He continued, “This whistleblower – I went back and read the complaint last night – virtually everything in that complaint has now been verified in public and public testimony, particularly … the partial transcript of the call confirms exactly what the whistleblower said. So who it is, I don’t care if it’s Tom Brady. It doesn’t matter because the investigation is what happened. This is a distraction, John. This is an effort, and if the name comes out, they’re going to spend a week finding his grandmother voted Democratic for Franklin Roosevelt or something. It has nothing to do with the facts, and it’s simply a distraction.”

King went on to warn about the “serious danger” to the whistleblower if the name comes out.

“If this name comes out by virtue of the pressure of members of Congress or the president or the White House and then something terrible happens to them, it’s on their heads,” he added. “This is bad stuff, John.”

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