Following several days of public back and forth of criticism between President Trump and Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski, President Trump tweeted that he would “support anyone with a pulse” against the longtime senator. The tweets come as their feud, which has been ongoing since 2016, recently heated up when Senator Murkowski defended James Mattis from several critical comments made toward President Trump following his response to the “peaceful protests.”
The remarks against Senator Murkowski started off with the President tweeting, “Few people know where they’ll be in two years, but I do, in the Great State of Alaska (which I love), campaigning against Senator Lisa Murkowski. She voted against Health Care, Justice Kavanaugh, and much else,” the first paragraph of the thread reads. The feud heated up earlier this month when Murkowski defended General James Mattis who criticized President Trump’s handling of the protests.
President Trump continued the Twitter thread, writing “Unrelated, I gave Alaska ANWR, major highways, and more. Get any candidate with a pulse, good or bad, I don’t care, I’m endorsing. If you have a pulse, I’m with you!”
The feud heated up this month when General James Mattis penned a letter condemning the President and saying that he was concerned about the way he handled the protests in several U.S cities.
“Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people—does not even pretend to try. Instead, he tries to divide us,” Mattis started his condemnation. He continued, saying, “We are witnessing the consequences of three years of this deliberate effort. We are witnessing the consequences of three years without mature leadership. We can unite without him, drawing on the strengths inherent in our civil society. This will not be easy, as the past few days have shown, but we owe it to our fellow citizens; to past generations that bled to defend our promise; and to our children.”
“I made the comments I made,” Sen Murkowski told CNN, “I stand by them. Again, I think its important that we have a president who is working to bring the people together… And tone and words matter.”
General Mattis resigned from his post in February of 2019 after he got into a dispute with President Trump about what to do with troops in Syria after the President started pulling them out. The feud escalated when the President said that he moved his resignation up to January 2019, and essentially fired Mattis. General Mattis stands by his resignation.
Senator Lisa Murkowski has consistently been voting against Trump and conservative interests, siding with Democratic opponents more often than any other Republican in Congress.
