US: Trump hits back after criticism by Supreme Court nominee
The US president had earlier hit out at a judge who had temporarily blocked his controversial immigration decree.
Washington: Donald Trump lashed out on Thursday at a Democratic senator who revealed that the president's own Supreme Court nominee had called Trump's attacks on the judiciary "disheartening" and "demoralising."
Having blasted a federal judge who temporarily blocked his controversial immigration decree -- calling him a "so-called judge" -- Trump renewed his attacks Wednesday on the appellate court panel currently weighing his ban on refugees and visitors from seven mainly Muslim countries, calling the judges "so political."
Judge Neil Gorsuch, nominated last week to fill a key vacancy on the Supreme Court, criticised Trump's stance during a meeting with Senator Richard Blumenthal, in remarks that were later confirmed to AFP by a spokesman for Gorsuch.
Trump, however, zeroed-in on Blumenthal.
"Sen.Richard Blumenthal, who never fought in Vietnam when he said for years he had (major lie), now misrepresents what Judge Gorsuch told him?" Trump wrote on Twitter today.
Blumenthal served during that period in the US Marines, but was never deployed to Vietnam, despite claims he made when he was running for the US Senate in 2010.
Trump himself obtained five deferments from the Vietnam war draft between 1965 and 1970, four on education grounds and one for bone spurs in his heels, according to The New York Times.