Trump signs defense bill, snubs McCain
WASHINGTON >> If President Donald Trump had wanted to make a gracious mention of John McCain, the ailing Republican senator from Arizona, he could have done it Monday, when the president signed the $716 billion military spending bill named in McCain’s honor.
He didn’t. Standing in front of soldiers and senior military leaders at Fort Drum in New York, Trump made no mention of McCain, 81, who has been one of the president’s fiercest critics but has largely been absent from the Senate as he struggles with advanced brain cancer.
The president studiously avoided reading the official name of the legislation — which would have meant mentioning McCain — during the 28-minute speech or during the signing ceremony afterward. (The spending measure is officially called the John S. McCain National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2019.)
Trump called it the “the most significant investment in our military, and our war fighters in modern history,” but did not make any reference to McCain’s military service or decadeslong career fighting for the Pentagon budget.
The snub was not entirely unexpected. The president has repeatedly disparaged McCain, usually without using his name, even in the months since the senator has largely retreated from the Washington scene to his Arizona home for cancer treatment.
At a June rally, Trump criticized McCain for voting against a Republican bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act, saying that “one senator decided to put the thumb down, late in the morning. That was not a good thing when he put the thumb down.”
The president mocked him the same way during a speech to conservatives in February, prompting loud and angry boos from the audience at the reference to McCain. And just hours after signing the military spending bill Monday, he did the same thing at a fundraiser in upstate New York.