A top Republican senator has launched an extraordinary public attack on Donald Trump, claiming the White House was running an “adult day care centre” and that the president’s behaviour could lead the country into the third world war.
Bob Corker, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, was responding to a Twitter barrage from the president in which he accused the Tennessee Republican, who has announced he will not seek re-election next year, of lacking the “guts” to run again.
Mr Corker’s words, which came in tweets and an interview with the New York Times on Sunday, mark the most vituperative attack by a leading Republican lawmaker on the president, lifting the lid on the tense relations between the White House and senior party figures.