Actually, someone else suggested that he wanted them to stay so that he could take “credit” for bringing them home...
I agree, but I sense something else in play.
Think of it in the context of the Hostages being rleased from Iran AFTER President Reagan was sworn in. How is Carter remembered? The failed attempt to rescue the hostages. He failed. A failed Presidency.
It would be the ultimate insult from the left to President Bush. It is an attempt to write the history books. “Bush’s War” “The Bush War that Obama ended”
Not only does the left harbor an irrational, rabid hatred for Bush, they want to define him for the ages.