Meghan McCain, a co-host of ABC’s “The View,” berated the Arizona GOP on Saturday for a tweet critical of her late father, longtime US Sen. John McCain.
McCain, a vocal Republican, was angered by a tweet that slammed the legacy of her late father, who was the 2008 Republican presidential nominee and represented the state in the US Senate from 1987 until his death in August 2018.
“As the sun sets on 2020, remember that we’re never going back to the party of [Mitt] Romney, [Jeff] Flake, and [John] McCain,” the Arizona GOP’s official Twitter account stated. “The Republican Party is now, and forever will be, one for the working man and woman! God bless.”
McCain responded: “Honestly whomever is running this twitter account can go to hell.”
She also mocked the GOP’s statewide performance this past November, adding: “How’d that work out on Election Day in Arizona?”
In the most recent election, President-elect Joe Biden became the first Democratic presidential nominee to win the state since Bill Clinton in 1996. Democrat Mark Kelly was also elected to the Senate, beating appointed GOP Sen. Martha McSally to fill the remainder of Sen. McCain’s term in the Senate.
Cindy McCain, Sen. McCain’s widow, endorsed Biden in the 2020 presidential election.
Over the past few years, Meghan McCain has often lamented the direction of the GOP under Trump, as her father was a constant target of attacks from the president.
Less than a month ago, McCain criticized Trump on Twitter for calling her late father “one of the most overrated people in D.C.”
“Two years after he died, you still obsess over my dad,” she wrote. “It kills you that no one will ever love you or remember you like they loved and remember him. He served his country with honor, you have disgraced the office of the presidency. You couldn’t even pull it out in Arizona.”
Sen. McCain, who withdrew his support of Trump in the run-up to the 2016 presidential election, was also the pivotal vote that kept the Affordable Care Act largely in place, which has angered the president for years.
Since the death of Sen. McCain and the retirement of former Sen. Jeff Flake, the Arizona GOP has shifted further right.
Kelli Ward, chair of the Arizona Republican Party, has had an acrimonious relationship with the McCain family, having run a scorched-earth primary campaign against the late senator for the 2016 GOP Senate nomination, which she lost. McCain was reelected to a sixth term in the Senate that fall.
A Navy lieutenant and prisoner of war in Vietnam, Sen McCain rose to become one of the most influential and well-known senators in the body, maintaining a strong focus on defense and foreign affairs.
*story by Business Insider