Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) advised President Trump to chill on attacking Republican senators who would likely be deciding his fate, Politico reported.
During a private meeting between McConnell and Trump at the White House last week, the pair discussed several other topics, including the situation in Syria, but the bulk of the meeting was focused on Trump’s meandering thoughts about impeachment. McConnell reportedly warned Trump explicitly to stop attacking Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT), whom he recently called a “pompous ass.”
The warnings appear to have worked slightly. Trump’s reportedly been communicating with McConnell more regularly in recent weeks and has pulled back from attempting to lobby some key senators like Sens. Susan Collins (R-ME) and Marco Rubio (R-FL), according to Politico. He’s also stopped berating Romney regularly on his Twitter feed.
But Trump hasn’t fully laid off courting those Republicans who called his conversation with Vlodymyr Zelensky inappropriate. During a meeting with 10 Republicans last week who’ve indicated publicly they weren’t happy with the call, Trump reportedly vented about impeachment for some time after the group discussed Middle East policy.
“He said he thought the process was unfair and he hadn’t done anything wrong. And he wanted us to know that,” an attendee told Politico, adding that Trump didn’t criticize anyone in the room.