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Senators pass on confronting Trump over McCain comment

Several of John McCain's fellow Republican senators were outraged when a White House staffer reportedly mocked the Arizona senator's terminal cancer last week.

Tuesday was shaping up as the day when John McCain's fellow Republican senators would confront President Trump at a private luncheon.

The subject: A White House staffer who mocked McCain's terminal cancer last week after he opposed a Trump nominee.

"It doesn't matter," the staffer reportedly said of McCain, "he's dying anyway."

Several GOP senators said they were outraged by the comment.

"If I had said that I would apologize," said Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa.

There was no confrontation.

"The issue didn't come up," Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said after the weekly luncheon.

There was no apology by Trump.

"The president's made it pretty clear he doesn't apologize for things," said Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida. "It's something I don't necessarily agree with."

After speaking at a Scottsdale business luncheon Tuesday, Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey made his first comments on the White House controversy:

"I'm just going to state my respect for the McCain family, the comfort I want to send them. Everyone knows I hold Senator McCain in the highest regard. We miss his voice in Washington, D.C."

The governor tried to separate himself from the controversy — "I'll be accountable for my own administration"— but he added: "I don't think those comments are appropriate."

The senator's daughter Meghan McCain — the family's fiercest defender on social media and from her platform on ABC's "The View" — apparently is moving on.

She tweeted the words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.:

But the White House is not moving on. The president branded staffers who leaked the McCain comment as "traitors" and "cowards." Staff changes are expected.

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