Late Senator John McCain’s daughter Meghan has branded what she called Donald Trump’s “obsession” with her father “pathetic”, commenting on reports that the US president had taken aim at the Republican senator during a private lunch with TV anchors before the State of the Union address.
According to The New York Times, which Trump has repeatedly called “failing” and accused of spreading fake news, the president roasted his long-time adversary McCain along with prominent Democrats. While he called former Vice President Joseph Biden “dumb”, referred to Senator Chuck Schumer as a “nasty son of a b**ch” and targeted Republican McCain, bringing up his refusal to vote for Trump’s bill, which was intended to repeal Obamacare. He also took the time to ridicule the late senator’s literary success.
“By the way, he wrote a book and the book bombed”, Trump said, the NYT reports, apparently referring to McCain’s last release, The Restless Wave: Good Times, Just Causes, Great Fights and Other Appreciations, from April 2018.
The unexpected offensive prompted a response from Meghan McCain. In two tweets, she hinted that the US president might be haunted by her father’s “greatness”.
READ MORE: Stephen King Slams Trump as 'Chickens**t' Over Disrespecting McCain
Trump’s spiteful words targeting McCain have evoked criticism before. Among other things, Trump refused to recognise John McCain as a "war hero" in an interview in 2016, motivating it by the fact that the senator had been captured during the Vietnam War. McCain, for his part, opposed some of Trump's bills, including a crucial one designed at repealing former President Barack Obama’s health care programme.