The Slatest

The President Seems to Have Just Implied That He’s Glad John McCain Died and Went to Hell

Trump speaks into a microphone and gestures in front of a blue background.
Donald Trump at the Faith and Freedom Coalition conference in Washington on Wednesday. Mark Wilson/Getty Images

The president’s relationship with late Arizona Sen. John McCain continues to be characterized by tremendous grace and dignity:

It seems like Trump could possibly be complaining here about multiple senators, and it’s true that Republicans Bob Corker of Tennessee and Jeff Flake of Arizona recently left Congress after being occasionally reluctant to vote with the president. It’s also true that Republicans Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska voted against Obamacare repeal. But there’s only one senator who ultimately voted against Trump on a crucial bill and recently left Congress, which is John McCain. Also, the reason McCain left the Senate is that he died of brain cancer.

Now, “left for greener pastures” can mean “left for a new job,” so maybe what Trump meant by “less green” was that McCain had worse luck than Flake and Corker. But given that some people and institutions—such as this Georgia funeral home and these California horse-corpse removal specialists—also use “greener pastures” as a euphemism for eternal rest/heaven, and given that Trump would be glad if John McCain were in hell being tormented by Satan, I think that’s probably what he meant, right?