Republican senator Bill Cassidy describes shouting match with Trump over Iran
The Republican senator Bill Cassidy, who just lost re-election to a primary challenger backed by Donald Trump, told reporter he argued with the president over the war with Iran when he visited the US Capitol today.
Speaking to reporters after the president’s lunch with the Senate GOP, Cassidy, who on Tuesday was one of four Republicans who helped pass a war powers resolution intended to prevent the president from resuming hostilities with Iran, said Trump asked: “Why would anybody vote for the War Powers Act?”
“Is that a rhetorical question, or would you like to really know?” Cassidy said he replied.
When the president demanded an answer, the Louisiana senator said he stood up and said he wanted answers from the president, noting that a conflict Trump said would last four weeks has instead lasted four months without achieving the US objectives. After Cassidy reiterated that he would vote for war powers resolutions until he received a briefing that answered his questions, the senator said: “He did not particularly care for my comments [and] raised his voice. I lost my temper. That’s not appropriate, it’s the Irish in me. But I again matched his tone and his volume, and it went back and forth. But at some point my gut said, ‘OK, I’ll sit down’, and so I sat down and tried to de-escalate.”
Cassidy, who placed third in Louisiana’s Republican Senate primary after Trump endorsed one of his opponents, said: “I make no apologies for standing up to the president, if you will, trying to demand that more information be shared with the Senate, and more information be shared with the American people. I make no apologies for that, whatever. And if someone tries to bully me into not asking that question, I’m not going to accept that either. I am sticking up for the American people, even if I’m speaking to the president.”
With the conclusion of the president’s unusually brief remarks, delivered in a half-hearted manner, we are wrapping up our live coverage for the night. Here are the latest developments:
