Sen. John McCain loathes President Trump so much that he plans to diss him from beyond the grave.
The ailing Arizona Republican, who has brain cancer, is organizing his funeral – and close associates have told the White House that Trump will NOT be invited. But former Presidents Barak Obama and George W. Bush have been asked to deliver eulogies.
Instead, Vice President Mike Pence, who served with McCain in Congress, will be asked to attend the service, the New York Times reported Saturday. The ceremony will be held at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C.
A stream of politicians, including former Vice President Joe Biden and former Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, have been visiting McCain at his Arizona ranch and a nearby hospital in recent weeks.
McCain, 81, has been battling an aggressive form of brain cancer for nearly a year and is back home in Arizona after he underwent surgery last month for an intestinal infection.
The senator, the 2008 GOP presidential nominee, said in an audio excerpt this week of his forthcoming memoir, "I don't know how much longer I'll be here," according to a clip aired by NPR.
Trump’s long-running feud with McCain has roots in the early days of the 2016 presidential race. The senator criticized Trump for disparaging Mexican immigrants in the June 2015 speech in which he declared his candidacy.
Three weeks later, Trump called McCain “incompetent” and dismissed his experience as a prisoner of war in Vietnam.
“He’s not a war hero,” Trump told an Iowa crowd. “He’s a war hero because he was captured. I like people that weren’t captured.”