WASHINGTON: Donald Trump has sacked an aide who said cancer-stricken Senator John McCain’s opposition to a presidential nominee did not matter because “he’s dying anyway,” the White House announced Tuesday.
The White House was roiled by bipartisan fury over the remark attributed to Kelly Sadler in May.
“Kelly Sadler is no longer employed within the Executive Office of the President,” read a brief statement by deputy White House spokesman Raj Shah.
McCain, 81, had indicated he opposed the nomination of now CIA Director nominee Gina Haspel over her role in enhanced interrogation techniques under president George W. Bush.
The Arizona senator, who was held prisoner and tortured during the Vietnam War, is battling brain cancer.
CNN had quoted a White House official as saying Sadler, speaking at a staff meeting, meant the comment as a joke but that it flopped.
Another extraordinary attack against McCain that stunned Washington came around the same time from a fellow veteran, retired US Air Force lieutenant general Thomas McInerney, who said torture works because it made McCain spill sensitive information to his captors during his years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam.
The attacks, remarkable for their bluntness, triggered swift reaction from across the political spectrum, with lawmakers demanding an apology from Trump that never came.
Meghan McCain, a conservative commentator on ABC’s popular morning talk show “The View,” delivered an eloquent defense of her father, who is battling brain cancer at home in Arizona.
“I don’t understand what kind of environment you’re working in when that would be acceptable and then you can come to work the next day and still have a job,” she said at the time.
Her father is “all about character and bipartisanship and something greater than yourself,” Meghan McCain said, before adding a stinging message to the critics: “Nobody’s going to remember you.”
Members of Congress also rallied behind their ailing, war-hero colleague.
Trump, for his part, once mocked McCain’s war service, saying during the presidential campaign that “I like people that weren’t captured.”
Trump fires aide who joked about ‘dying’ war hero John McCain
Trump fires aide who joked about ‘dying’ war hero John McCain
- Kelly Sadler is no longer employed within the Executive Office of the President
- Lawmakers demanding an apology from Trump that never came
Trump said Iran ‘welcome to compete’ in World Cup, says Infantino
US President Donald Trump has said that Iran is “welcome” to participate at the upcoming World Cup in North America, despite the ongoing Middle East war, FIFA chief Gianni Infantino said on Wednesday.
The war, triggered by US-Israeli strikes on February 28, has thrown into doubt Iran’s participation at this summer’s men’s football World Cup, jointly hosted by Canada, Mexico and the United States.
During a meeting to discuss preparations for the competition, “we also spoke about the current situation in Iran,” Infantino, the head of world football’s governing body, wrote on Instagram.
“During the discussions, President Trump reiterated that the Iranian team is, of course, welcome to compete in the tournament in the United States,” he wrote.
The comments marked the first time that Infantino, who in December created a FIFA peace prize and awarded it to Trump, has acknowledged the ongoing war in the Middle East.
Trump’s remarks to Infantino are a stark contrast to his comments to Politico last week.
Trump told Politico: “I really don’t care” if Iran play at the World Cup.
FIFA’s president has grown close to Trump since he returned to the White House, even attending his inauguration.
Asylum claims
Iran’s federation football chief on Tuesday cast doubt on his team’s participation in the sporting extravaganza, following the defection of several women footballers from the Islamic republic during the Asian Cup in Australia.
“If the World Cup is like this, who in their right mind would send their national team to a place like this?” Mehdi Taj asked on Iranian state television.
While the event is spread out across three countries, Iran are scheduled to play all three group games in the United States, two in Los Angeles and one in Seattle.
Should Iran withdraw from the sport’s quadrennial showpiece, it would be the first time a country did that since France and India pulled out of the 1950 finals in Brazil.
On Tuesday, at the Women’s Asian Cup in Australia, some players from Iran’s team claimed asylum after they came under fire from state television for not singing the country’s national anthem before one match.
Five players, including captain Zahra Ghanbari, slipped away from the team hotel under the cover of darkness to claim sanctuary from Australian officials, the Australian government announced.
At least two more team members applied to stay later in the day, according to local media.
However, Australia’s Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke said on Wednesday that one of them had subsequently changed her mind.
Burke said in parliament on Wednesday that he had since been advised that one of the group “had spoken to some of the team mates that left and changed their mind.”
“She had been advised by her team mates and encouraged to contact the Iranian embassy,” he said.
“As a result of that, it meant the Iranian embassy now knew the location of where everybody was.”
The remaining players have been moved from a safe house to another location, he said.
