McCarthy did however manage to anger one key constituent. According to a source familiar, a stir-crazy Trump has spent the last two days livid and fuming to aides and allies about what he views as a betrayal by McCarthy for standing by Cheney and not punishing her for her vote to impeach. This just over a week after McCarthy made an appeal to Trump by visiting him down at Mar-a-Lago and extracting a public commitment that the former President will work to elect a Republican House majority in 2022.
Trump isn’t the only Republican disappointed with McCarthy. Many in the establishment were looking for a more direct and stinging rebuke of Greene from the GOP leader. They worry failure to do so has damaged the party’s ability to win by tying its brand to a conspiracy theorist.
“Kevin never takes a stand, he is always on every side of every issue,” said one influential Republican adviser, who called the episode a “huge embarrassment and failure of leadership.”
“Does he want to be the Republican party or the QAnon party?” the adviser added.
