Donald Trump got up on Friday morning and did what he usually does when a Republican doesn’t completely obey him: he went all out on Truth Social. He blasted “Thom Tillis, the weak and ineffective Senator from North Carolina,” claiming he couldn’t “fight it out in the Senate” and “lacked the courage” to run again. Trump took full credit for ending Tillis’s political career, saying, “When I told him that I wouldn’t endorse him for another run because it was too much work and drama — he couldn’t have won anyway! — he quickly dropped out and announced he would ‘retire.’ I thought, ‘Wow, that was easy!'” Trump wrapped up with his opinion: “The media praised him for taking me on, but he wasn’t brave; he was just a quitter!”
Tillis read everything Trump wrote.
Then he sat down and wrote a response that should be displayed for every Republican who still stands up for themselves. “Mr. President, I completely agree that we should have a lot of fun over these next seven months,” Tillis began, before carefully tearing apart Trump’s close advisors, one by one.
Regarding the $1.8 billion fund for January 6th rioters, Tillis called it “using taxpayer money to pay convicted felons and thugs who attacked police,” naming Trump’s DOJ pardon official Ed Martin directly.
On housing issues, Tillis criticized the push for 50-year mortgages and “Elizabeth Warren’s housing bill over solid conservative housing policy,” specifically mentioning Bill Pulte. (Tillis claimed that it was Elizabeth Warren’s bill being supported by Trump’s team, but it’s actually a bipartisan bill co-written with South Carolina Republican Senator Tim Scott).
On Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Tillis accused him of promoting policies that turn “publicly traded companies into state-owned businesses.”
This is from a party that has spent years warning against socialism. On Pete Hegseth, Tillis claimed Trump’s Defense Secretary was “firing our best generals and not holding Putin accountable for his systematic kidnapping, rape, torture, and murder of Ukrainian civilians.”
Then came the strong point: “If opposing these things makes me a RINO, then I proudly take that label.
We want Republicans to succeed in November, but the foolishness is hurting our chances.” Trump called a senator who disagrees with paying rioters and protecting war criminals a “quitter” and a “nitpicker.” Tillis accurately labeled that as “the foolishness.”
Thom Tillis has seven months left in the Senate, and it seems he has chosen to spend them challenging Trump’s lies and foolishness.
Good for him.
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