Feud Between Trump, Corker Escalates
Tennessee senator says the president should stay out of negotiations over tax plan, prompting Twitter rebuke
Mr. Corker, a Tennessee Republican, said the president should stay out of negotiations over the tax-overhaul effort. Mr. Corker has played a key role in the tax bill so far, cutting a crucial deal with Sen. Pat Toomey (R., Pa.) on the Senate’s budget, allowing for up to $1.5 trillion in tax cuts over a decade.
.. “I would just like him to leave it to the professionals for a while, and see if we can do something that’s constructive,” Mr. Corker said ..
Mr. Trump responded .. where he called Mr. Corker a “lightweight,” referred to him as “liddle’ Bob Corker,” said the two-term senator “couldn’t get elected dog catcher.”
.. “I think that he’s proven himself unable to rise to the occasion. I think many of us, me included, have tried to…I’ve intervened, I’ve had private dinner. I’ve been with him on multiple occasions to try to create some kind of aspirational approach, if you will, to the way that he conducts himself. But I don’t think that that’s possible, and he’s obviously not going to rise to the occasion as president.”
.. Many Republicans now believe coming up short on a tax-code rewrite would cost them control of the House majority, and Mr. Corker’s comments risk undermining it.