President Donald Trump said Saturday that Sen. Lisa Murkowski “will never recover” from the political consequences of opposing now-confirmed Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination to the Supreme Court, The Washington Post reported.
“I think she will never recover from this,” Trump told the paper. “I think the people from Alaska will never forgive her for what she did.”
Trump also predicted that if the Alaska Republican runs again when she is up for reelection in 2022, she will lose the Republican primary, the newspaper reported.
“She doesn’t run for four years … she’s lucky,” Trump told the Post. “But they will not forget. They will never forget. What she did was unacceptable. Really unacceptable.”
In addition to lambasting Murkowski, a key swing vote, for her stance, Trump praised Sen. Susan Collins, another swing vote, for her yes vote.
“I thought that Susan was incredible yesterday,” Trump told reporters Saturday as he left the White House to fly to Kansas for a political rally. “She gave an impassioned, beautiful speech yesterday. And that was from the heart, that was from the heart.”
The President also dismissed the possibility of strong Democratic challengers mounting a campaign based on Collins’ yes vote.
“I think Collins is so popular right now for what she did,” he told the Post.
Soon after Collins announced her vote for Kavanaugh, former Obama national security adviser Susan Rice, and Speaker of the Maine House Sara Gideon expressed interest in challenging Collins.
CNN’s Liz Stark contributed to this report.