Rand Paul Slams White House ‘Immaturity’ After Family Disinvited from Picnic
A controversy has erupted at the White House after Senator Rand Paul and his family were disinvited from the annual bipartisan picnic, with the Kentucky Republican labelling the move as "incredibly petty" and a sign of "immaturity" from the Trump administration.
According to Yahoo News, Paul, a libertarian-minded deficit hawk, had been planning to attend the picnic on the White House lawn with his family, including his nearly six-month-old grandson. However, the invitation was abruptly rescinded with no explanation, a move that Paul believes was a direct result of his criticisms of President Donald Trump’s sweeping policy bill.
"The level of immaturity is beyond words," Paul said, adding that he’s lost "a lot of respect" for Trump. "It’s just incredibly petty… I don’t know. I just think it really makes me lose a lot of respect I once had for Donald Trump," he told CNN outside the Capitol on Wednesday evening, as reported by Yahoo News.
Paul has been raising deep concerns over Trump’s policy bill, particularly with regards to the national debt limit. He has indicated that he couldn’t support the bill because it includes an increase in the national debt limit, but has said he’d be open to considering it if GOP leaders removed that from the overall bill. The White House and top Republicans have rebuffed Paul’s demand, leading to a tense standoff.
The move could be a risk for Trump, as he can only afford to lose the support of three Republican senators to pass his agenda through the Senate. Paul’s criticisms have been vocal, and the White House has been trying to sway him to support the bill. However, Paul believes that the decision to disinvite his family from the picnic was a personal attack.
"It’s just, I think, a really sad day that this is the level of warfare they’ve stooped to," Paul said, as quoted by Yahoo News. "But it’s also not very effective. It probably has the opposite result." Paul added that it’s unclear if the directive came directly from the president or "petty staffers who have been running a sort of a paid influencer campaign against me for two weeks on Twitter."
The senator also took a shot at one of the most powerful aides in the White House, Stephen Miller, suggesting that he and others like him are behind the campaign against him. "You have people that are basically going around casually talking about getting rid of habeas corpus… And the same people that are directing this campaign are the same people that casually would throw out parts of the Constitution and suspend habeas corpus," Paul said.
When asked if he was speaking about Miller, Paul nodded. When asked by CNN if he believes Miller should still be working at the White House, Paul would only say: "I’m just going to leave it at that." Paul’s comments suggest that there is a deep divide between him and the Trump administration, with the senator expressing frustration at the level of personal attacks he has faced.
The incident has raised questions about the level of petty squabbling within the Trump administration, with Paul noting that he has been to 10 White House picnics in the past, including during the Obama and Biden administrations. "President Obama didn’t disinvite us …. Biden didn’t disinvite us, and we always did this," Paul said, as reported by Yahoo News. "It’s the Americans’ White House. We all pay for it."
The White House has yet to comment on the incident, but Yahoo News has reached out for a statement. The controversy highlights the increasingly tense relationship between Trump and Paul, with the senator’s criticisms of the president’s policy bill causing friction between the two. As the debate over the bill continues, it remains to be seen how this incident will affect the dynamics within the Republican Party.
