In a Wednesday morning interview with Fox & Friends, White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci characterized himself as a “front-stabbing person,” as opposed to a person who backstabs, while defending President Donald Trump’s early morning tweet lashing out at Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) for her decision to vote against the motion to proceed on the health care bill.
“That's a classic New Yorker, letting you know exactly how you feel,” Scaramucci said. He went on:
What I don't like about Washington is people do not let you know how they feel. They're very nice to your face and then they take a shiv or a machete and they stab it in your back. I don't like it. I'm a Wall Street guy and I’m more of a front-stabbing person, and I would rather people tell directly how I feel about them than this sort of nonsense.
After his gory analogy, Scaramucci added: “Now that senator knows how the president feels about her.”
Senator @lisamurkowski of the Great State of Alaska really let the Republicans, and our country, down yesterday. Too bad!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 26, 2017
President Trump took to Twitter early Tuesday morning, in advance of the Senate vote on motion to proceed (a necessary procedural step to begin debate on the several health care bills under consideration), writing: “Repeal or Repeal & Replace! I have pen in hand.”
On Tuesday afternoon, the motion to proceed passed the Senate, but two Republican senators — Murkowski and Susan Collins (R-ME) — voted against the motion, which forced Vice President Mike Pence to break the tie. The Better Care Reconciliation Act later failed in the Senate, 43-57, on Tuesday night. Wednesday morning, Trump posted his criticism of Murkowski, who “voted no yesterday just to debate repeal and replace” as co-host Ainsley Earhardt puts it.
On Wednesday morning, Scaramucci had not one, but two odd metaphors to share on Fox & Friends:
Let me draw a metaphor for you. Let’s say you’re the head coach of a football team and in this case you have 50 or 52 people on the team and you are trying to get everybody together, but it's like corralling cats. And you know if you subordinate your own ego and subordinate your own ego for the country, for the people of the United States, and for the Republican Party, the right thing to do is to stand side by side with the president. When you're not doing that, and imagine him as a football coach in the locker room, do you think that you're going to get chewed a little bit if you are not on side running the offensive coordination in the right way?
It’s unlikely that Republican senators, or really any senators, see themselves in this way. As John McCain said just yesterday, “Whether or not we are of the same party, we are not the president's subordinates. We are his equal!”
Here is a partial transcript of Scaramucci, Earhardt, and Steve Doocey’s exchange:
AINSLEY EARHARDT: Even this morning’s latest tweet is going after a Republican senator, Lisa Murkowski, because she was one of the two Republican holdouts. The ones who voted no yesterday just to debate repeal and replace. Here’s his latest tweet: “Senator Lisa Murkowski of the great state of Alaska really let the Republicans and our country down yesterday. Too bad!” Can we expect more tweets like this holding Republicans accountable if they are not — if they don't agree with him?
SCARAMUCCI: Let me draw a metaphor for you. Let’s say you’re the head coach of a football team and in this case you have 50 or 52 people on the team and you are trying to get everybody together, but it's like corralling cats. And you know if you subordinate your own ego and subordinate your own ego for the country, for the people of the United States, and for the Republican Party, the right thing to do is to stand side by side with the president. When you're not doing that, and imagine him as a football coach in the locker room, do you think that you're going to get chewed a little bit if you are not on side running the offensive coordination in the right way?
STEVE DOOCY: Right.
SCARAMUCCI: So to me, that's a classic New Yorker, letting you know exactly how you feel. What I don't like about Washington is people do not let you know how they feel. They're very nice to your face and then they take a shiv or a machete and they stab it in your back. I don't like it. I'm a Wall Street guy and I’m more of a front-stabbing person, and I would rather people tell directly how I feel about them than this sort of nonsense.
EARHARDT: Have you heard directly from her? Do you know why she voted that way?
SCARAMUCCI: Let me finish. Now that senator knows how the president feels about her, and why don't you fix it? He is the president of the United States. He’s the leader of the free world. Come here, and let's fix it and let's work together for the agenda and for the goals that we have that are going to better the American people. That's what we have to do. Stop the nonsense.
DOOCY: That’s right, because she personally voted to repeal and replace many, many times until now and, of course, she was reelected just last November. So she has six years on the clock in the Senate.
