Hours after Sen.-elect Mitt Romney (R-Utah) dropped a scathing op-ed calling President Donald Trump’s tenure a total disappointment, the commander in chief’s 2020 campaign manager, Brad Parscale, came out swinging in the president’s defense.
“The truth is @MittRomney lacked the ability to save this nation,” Parscale wrote on Twitter late Tuesday night. ”@realDonaldTrump has saved it. Jealously is a drink best served warm and Romney just proved it. So sad, I wish everyone had the courage @realDonaldTrump had.”
While the Trump cheerleader’s remark on jealousy was clearly intended as a jab at Romney, it mostly just confused Twitter, where many users wondered what he was trying to say.
“Insouciance is a drink best served at room temperature and sea level,” joked Tom Nichols, Naval War College professor and writer. “I don’t know what that means, but I don’t know what Parscale meant either.”
In a post of his own, CNN’s Jake Tapper simply quoted the bewildering line with an added question mark.
Romney, who will enter the Senate this week, rebuked Trump in his Washington Post article by calling out his behavior at home and on the world stage.
While Romney praised the president’s appointment of leaders such as Jeff Sessions, Nikki Haley and Rex Tillerson, all of whom have now been pushed out of their posts in the administration, Romney added that Trump’s “conduct over the past two years, particularly his actions this month, is evidence that the president has not risen to the mantle of the office.”
Still, Romney made clear he will attempt to collaborate with the president, regardless of politics.
“I will support policies that I believe are in the best interest of the country and my state, and oppose those that are not,” Romney wrote. “I do not intend to comment on every tweet or fault. But I will speak out against significant statements or actions that are divisive, racist, sexist, anti-immigrant, dishonest or destructive to democratic institutions.”
Romney will be sworn in as a senator on Thursday.