Donald Trump has been venting his frustrations about the televised House select committee hearings to anyone who will listen at his Bedminster golf club, according to a new report.
The twice-impeached former president is furious that he doesn't have any supporters on the panel, and he blames House minority leader Kevin McCarthy's decision to boycott after House speaker Nancy Pelosi rejected two of the GOP lawmakers he chose, and he is exasperated that he doesn't have a window into their findings so he can preemptively respond to testimony, reported CNN on Tuesday.
"Unfortunately, a bad decision was made," Trump told conservative talk radio host Wayne Allyn Root. "This committee was a bad decision, not to have representation on that committee. That was a very, very foolish decision because you know, they try and pretend like they're legit, and only when you get into the inner workings you say, 'what kind of a thing is this? It's just a one-sided witch hunt.'"
"We have no representation on this panel," he added. "We should certainly have some Republicans, real Republicans ... We have nobody on that panel who can fight back. In a way, the Republicans should be ashamed of themselves."
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Trump has publicly and privately railed against former vice president Mike Pence, whose chief of staff Marc Short and chief counsel Greg Jacob have been key witnesses in the hearings, but the former president has been pleased by counter-programming offered by conservative media.
"I don't see him letting up on Mike anytime soon and, frankly, the more Mike is out there doing things with clear 2024 undertones, the more he is going to make trouble for himself," said one Trump adviser.