Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo warned during a Friday press briefing that Republican Senate candidate Dr. Mehmet Oz was a potential national security threat due to his ties with his native country of Turkey.

Pompeo’s remarks come after ABC News reported this week on a photograph that showed Oz voting in Turkish elections as recently as 2018. Oz was also accused this week of violating  the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) by not registering as a foreign agent while he was doing work for Turkish Airlines, which is 49.12% owned by the Turkish government.

“We criticize American candidates all the time because they didn’t vote. This is different from that,” Pompeo said. “Not only did he not engage in the American [process] but he engaged in the Turkish political process. That raises in my mind a lot of judgments about his priority.”

Oz’s campaign responded by claiming that the remarks from Pompeo, who also previously served as the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), were “pathetic and xenophobic.”

A letter this week from Armenian National Committee of America Executive Director Aram Hamparian to Matthew G. Olsen, Assistant Attorney General for National Security, urged the Department of Justice to launch an investigation into whether Oz violated FARA.