Trump calls McConnell political hack

WASHINGTON: Former United States president Donald Trump lashed out at Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell yesterday, signalling a growing feud between the two most senior Republican Party voices.

‘‘Mitch is a dour, sullen, and unsmiling political hack, and if Republican senators are going to stay with him, they will not win again,’’ Trump said in a statement just three days after McConnell excoriated him following the former president’s second impeachment trial, on a charge of inciting the deadly attack on the US Capitol.

Trump and McConnell parted ways in the weeks after the November 3 presidential election, Trump irked that McConnell had recognised Democrat Joe Biden as the winner in midDecember.

The loss of both the White House to Biden and control of the Senate — which Democrats picked up last month — leaves Republicans on edge as they plot how to win back congressional control in 2022.

The gap between the two men widened when McConnell declared on the Senate floor after Trump’s acquittal by the chamber on Saturday that Trump was ‘‘practically and morally responsible’’ for the Capitol attack.