Donald Trump Jr. said he loves how his father President Donald Trump dismantled former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush during the 2016 campaign Wednesday after the son and brother of former presidents suggested Trump's children don't love him.
During a talk at Yale University Tuesday, Bush said that after facing off against Trump during the 2016 Republican primaries and losing he was thankful to return home to children who "actually love me."
"I'm not going to talk about the 2016 election," Bush said according to the Yale Daily News, adding "I'm still in therapy." Bush said the president is "Republican in basically name only."
Trump's eldest son took issue with Bush's suggestion that the president's children don't love him.
"Jeb! I love everything about my father. I love that he's a fighter, I love that he has guts, I love that he's President (all those things you're not)," Trump Jr. wrote in a tweet.
Jeb! I love everything about my father. I love that he’s a fighter, I love that he has guts, I love that he’s President (all those things you’re not)
— Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) March 29, 2018
Also love that he learned enough about politics in a few weeks to dismantle you piece by piece despite it being your life’s work https://t.co/4fcnA1AgAa
Trump, he said, "learned enough about politics in a few weeks to dismantle you piece by piece despite it being your life's work."
During the Republican primary, candidate Trump repeatedly levelled insults at Bush, calling him "low energy"—a label that stuck with him throughout the rest of his campaign.
Bush indicated Tuesday that Republicans have lost their way under Trump. "Sadly the fracturing of the conservative movement could not come at a worse time," he said.
"The 21st-century conservative agenda cannot be nostalgic about the past," he added advocating for immigration reform that doesn't hurt the economy and greater globalization.
Both his father President George H.W. Bush and brother President George W. Bush have criticized Trump and his impact on the Republican Party.
The president hasn't always received high praise from his children, either. Early this week his youngest daughter, Tiffany Trump, liked a photo on Instagram of a man holding a placard at the March for Our Lives gun control rally on Sunday that read: "Next massacre will be the GOP in the Midterm Elections."
During the 2016 election Trump said that he was proud of his daughter "to a lesser extent" than his other children because she had just graduated from college.
The president's eldest children, however, have been given large responsibilities in his business and administration. Trump Jr. and his brother Eric Trump have been put in charge of their father's company, The Trump Organization, while he serves as president. And Trump's eldest daughter Ivanka Trump is a senior advisor in the White House.
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Graham Lanktree covers U.S. politics for Newsweek. He is based in London and frequently appears as a contributor on BBC ... Read more
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