Donald Trump is still complaining about John McCain, the late GOP Senator from Arizona who was also a past presidential nominee from his party and was known for his prior service in the military, during which he became a prisoner of war.
Trump was notoriously at odds with McCain in the period when the Arizonan’s final years in office and the early portions of Trump’s presidency overlapped. Now, Trump was complaining in a new campaign speech in Iowa about McCain’s opposition to a plan that emerged under Trump that would have undone the Affordable Care Act, otherwise known as Obamacare. Republicans have never secured a complete rollback of the law despite years and years of attempts. The legislation expanded access to health care coverage for many Americans through financial support, expansion of Medicaid, new protections for consumers, and even an online marketplace for obtaining coverage.
In the Iowa remarks, in which Trump also complained about Abraham Lincoln’s handling of the Civil War and suggested he himself could have done better, Trump also spoke derisively about what in actuality was a physical impairment sustained by McCain during his imprisonment in war. Trump derisively observed that McCain didn’t raise his arm upwards very high when opposing that ploy against Obamacare during voting in the Senate.
Mark Kelly, a Democrat who now holds McCain’s seat in the Senate, having won a full term of six years in the midterms last year, spoke out. “Donald Trump doesn’t know anything about what it means to put others before yourself and sacrifice for your country. That was how John McCain lived his life, and in Arizona we’re proud of that,” the Democrat said on X, the platform formerly called Twitter.
Trump’s past rhetoric includes even mocking the idea that McCain should be regarded as a hero. “He’s not a war hero,” Trump infamously said years ago. “He was a war hero because he was captured. I like people who weren’t captured.” Some might have thought Republicans would break with Trump as his actual character, exemplified by comments like these, became clearer. Such, of course, didn’t happen.
Donald Trump doesn’t know anything about what it means to put others before yourself and sacrifice for your country. That was how John McCain lived his life, and in Arizona we’re proud of that. https://t.co/C9GbcmpM72
— Captain Mark Kelly (@CaptMarkKelly) January 7, 2024
