Cue the creepy back-woods banjo music.
The top Republican in the Senate, who has been the target of Trump’s ire, deflected questions about the escalating fight between Corker and Trump.
“Sen. Corker is a valuable member of the Senate Republican caucus and he’s also on the Budget committee and a particularly important player as we move to the floor on the budget next week and he’s an important part of our team,” Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said Monday during a stop in Hazard, Kentucky.
Not long before Trump’s tweeting, White House budget director Mick Mulvaney said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that “it’s going to be fun to work” with Corker, “especially now that he’s not running for re-election, because I think it sort of unleashes him to do whatever — and say whatever — he wants to say.”
In his interview with the Times, Corker said: “Look, except for a few people, the vast majority of our caucus understands what we’re dealing with here,” adding that “of course they understand the volatility that we’re dealing with and the tremendous amount of work that it takes by people around him to keep him in the middle of the road.”
Corker is the latest Republican to face Trump’s wrath. The president in recent months has lit into McConnell over the failure of the GOP to repeal and replace Obama’s health care law, and specifically targeted Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, for their opposition to GOP health legislation.
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