McCain rarin’ to go In fighting spirit vs. cancer & Trump

An upbeat Sen. John McCain is feeling “fine” after receiving treatment to battle brain cancer and showing no signs of softening his criticisms of President Trump.

“I’m facing a challenge, but I’ve faced other challenges,” McCain (R-Ariz.) told CNN’s “State of the Union” in his first Sunday interview since his July cancer diagnosis. “And I’m very confident about getting through this one as well.”

McCain, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, will lead the debate on defense-authorization legislation this week after undergoing chemotherapy and radiation. He’ll get an MRI Monday to evaluate the effectiveness of the treatment for primary glioblastoma, a type of brain tumor.

“I’m fine,” McCain told anchor Jake Tapper. “The prognosis is pretty good. Look, this is a very vicious form of cancer that I’m facing, but all the results so far are excellent. Everything is fine. [I have] more energy than ever.”

Since his return to the Senate, McCain has continued to be an open critic of Trump, including of the president’s decision to forge a three-month deal with Democrats over government funding and raising the debt ceiling.

The deal was “not an exercise in bipartisanship” because Republicans were blindsided, McCain said, adding that it keeps in place current funding levels for the military that will be “basically devastating to national defense.”

The acerbic senator also criticized Trump’s decision to end immigration protections for Dreamers and for the president’s refusal to embrace climate-change science, saying, “Things [are] happening with the climate in the world that is unprecedented.”

McCain is hoping for a comprehensive immigration-reform solution.

“It is not conscionable to tell young people who came here as children that they have to go back to a country that they don’t know,” he said.