Politics

Trump bashes George W. Bush, ‘flunky’ Rove over Liz Cheney fundraiser

Former President Donald Trump attacked George W. Bush and his longtime consigliere Karl Rove Wednesday after it emerged the pair would headline a Texas fundraiser for Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) next month.

“RINO former President George ‘Dubya’ Bush and his flunky Karl Rove are endorsing warmongering and very low polling, Liz Cheney,” Trump’s emailed statement began.

The 45th president reiterated earlier statements about the 43rd president being “the one who got us into the quicksand of the Middle East and, after spending trillions of dollars and killing nearly a million people, the Middle East was left in worse shape after 21 years than it was when he started his stupidity.

“It ended with Biden’s most embarrassing in history withdrawal from Afghanistan, a total surrender, leaving $85 Billion dollars [sic] of equipment and many young Warriors lives behind,” Trump continued.

Politico first reported on the Oct. 18 fundraiser in Dallas, which will also feature former Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchinson and former Bush White House counsel (and ill-fated Supreme Court nominee) Harriet Miers.

Trump took aim at Bush for not pardoning former Dick Cheney aide Scooter Libby while in office. Photo by MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images

Trump then accused Bush of lacking “the courage to give a pardon to his Vice President’s Chief of Staff, Scooter Libby, even though [Dick] Cheney begged for him to do so. He wouldn’t, they didn’t talk for years.”

Libby, who was convicted in 2007 of lying to the FBI and obstruction of justice in connection with the 2003 leak of the identity of CIA operative Valerie Plame, was granted a full pardon by Trump in April 2018.

“I didn’t know Scooter, but gave him a full pardon—not at their request, but because he deserved it. He suffered greatly,” said the former president, who added that Dick Cheney had “called to effusively thank me.

Trump also called Karl Rove a “flunky.” Photo by Michael Kovac/Getty Images

“Now he is on the side of his daughter who is so bad for Wyoming and the United States that she is polling at record lows,” Trump concluded.

Trump has repeatedly attacked Cheney since she voted to impeach him following the deadly Jan. 6 riot at the US Capitol. Cheney, one of two Republicans on the House select committee examining the events of that day, has accused Trump of being responsible for the violence and has vowed to ensure that he “never again gets anywhere near the Oval Office.”

In May, Cheney was removed as House Republican Conference chair, the third-highest position in the chamber’s GOP leadership. The vote by her colleagues to oust her was due in part to Cheney’s ongoing criticism of the former president.

Earlier this month, Trump endorsed Harriet Hageman, one of Cheney’s Republican primary challengers, and described the incumbent in a statement as a “warmonger and disloyal Republican.”

Last week, Trump tore into Bush after he appeared to reference the Capitol riot in a speech marking the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.

Trump has already endorsed Cheny’s Republican primary opponent Harriet Hageman. Andrew Harnik/Pool via Xinhua

“There is little cultural overlap between violent extremists abroad and violent extremists at home,” Bush said. “But in their disdain for pluralism, in their disregard for human life, in their determination to defile national symbols, they are children of the same foul spirit. And it is our continuing duty to confront them.”

Trump responded two days later, saying that the 43rd president “shouldn’t be lecturing us about anything.”

“The World Trade Center came down during his watch,” he wrote. “Bush led a failed and uninspiring presidency. He shouldn’t be lecturing anybody!​”

Cheney’s campaign has enjoyed fundraising success, taking in nearly $1.9 million in the second quarter of this year after raising more than $1.5 million in the first.

With Post wires