Trump’s Behind The Scenes Rage At GOP Colleagues Reported By ‘POLITICO’

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This weekend, ex-President Donald Trump is slated to speak at this year’s edition of the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Orlando, Florida, and ahead of his remarks — which will constitute his first public appearance since leaving the White House — POLITICO is reporting that the former commander-in-chief has been privately raging over top Republican leaders including House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (Calif.). Although McCarthy didn’t vote in favor of impeaching Trump on a charge of incitement of insurrection after the Trump-inspired storming of the Capitol, other Republicans did, and Trump is reportedly upset over McCarthy’s advocacy to keep one of those Republicans — Rep. Liz Cheney (Wyo.) — in their leadership position among House GOP’ers.

Cheney has been vocally critical of Trump following the Capitol violence, and most recently, at a press availability featuring House Republican leaders, she said that she does not think that Trump should have a role in the Republican Party or country as they move forward. McCarthy is much more of an attempted unifier than an open endorser of Cheney’s ideas, but the top House Republican has faced Trump’s ire anyway.

POLITICO’s Tara Palmieri reported as follows:

‘Three people close to Trump tell me that he’s stewing anew over Kevin McCarthy. It’s become so frequent that his advisers think the House minority leader may be in for a public reprimand. That’s even after the powwow at Mar-a-Lago where McCarthy tried to patch things up after he denounced Trump for the violence on Jan. 6. The reason for Trump’s displeasure: an emboldened Cheney.’

As POLITICO put it, every time that “Cheney criticizes Trump from her leadership post as the No. 3 House Republican, he’s reminded that it was McCarthy who pleaded with his conference to keep her on as chair — despite her vote to impeach Trump.” Recently, Cheney won a vote on the question of whether to keep her in a leadership position, and it wasn’t close — although there were a significant number of House Republicans, led by figures like Rep. Matt Gaetz (Fla.), who vocally voted against her.

Ahead of Trump’s remarks at CPAC, the conference has already devolved into familiar right-wing chaos. Gaetz himself was a speaker, and he went on a rant about rebranding at the Hasbro toy company, which changed their branding for the Mr. Potato Head line of toys to “Potato Head” (the individual characters still have their classic names). As the nation struggles through the COVID-19 pandemic, these are the priorities of top Republicans — the imaginary villain of “cancel culture.”