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Joe Biden expected to name Cindy McCain as ambassador to UK

The widow of the late Republican Senator John McCain has been a fierce critic of Donald Trump and crossed party lines to endorse Mr Biden.

Joe Middleton
Saturday 28 November 2020 05:27 EST
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Trump says he'll leave the White House if the Electoral College formalises Biden's victory

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President-elect Joe Biden is reportedly expected to name Cindy McCain as his ambassador to the UK.

The widow of the late Republican Senator John McCain has been a fierce critic of Donald Trump and crossed party lines to endorse Mr Biden.

Ms McCain, 66, is a known Anglophile and thought to be a frontrunner for the job as a reward for helping to win the state of Arizona for the Democrats.

A source told The Times: “It’s hers if she wants it. She delivered Arizona. They know that.”

It is not clear if Ms McCain would be interested in the role. After her husband’s death, she has concentrated on philanthropic work related to her husband’s charitable foundation.

Ms McCain’s employment by the incoming administration would be seen as a fitting end to a feud between her husband and President Trump.

Mr Trump upset Senator McCain after mocking his status as a former prisoner of war. The Republican’s plane was shot down over Hanoi, Vietnam, in 1967.

His captors found out his father was a senior officer for US forces and offered him early release - he refused and spent five years as a prisoner.

The President angered Mr McCain, by saying he was not “a war hero because he was captured.”

The former senator, who was one of the few Republicans to stand up to Mr Trump, was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor and later died in August 2018. The President was not invited to the funeral.

In September Ms McCain backed Mr Biden’s White House campaign after the President had called veterans “suckers and losers”.

She told 60 minutes on CBS: “For me, the final straw was the, you know, ‘They’re losers and suckers.’”

“It angered me a great deal. It angered me. And so I thought, you know, I can either sit here and be angry or I can do something.”

“You know, I’m the mother of two veterans and a wife of a veteran, and my father was a veteran. They were not losers and suckers by any chance.”

 

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