WASHINGTON — President Trump called West Wing leakers “traitors and cowards” Monday as a dustup over a White House aide’s crass remark about Arizona Sen. John McCain extended into a fifth day.

In a Monday afternoon tweet, Trump said the “leaks coming out of the White House are a massive over exaggeration put out by the Fake News Media in order to make us look as bad as possible.”

The White House says it has dealt internally with a crass comment about Sen. John McCain made by special assistant to President Trump, Kelly Sadler, shown in March. Trump, however, has publicly criticized whoever leaked the comment. Associated Press/Manuel Balce Ceneta

He added of the leakers: “We will find out who they are!”

During a closed-door meeting last week, Trump communications aide Kelly Sadler dismissed McCain’s opposition to the president’s CIA nominee by saying of the Arizona Republican: “He’s dying anyway.” The 81-year-old McCain was diagnosed in July with glioblastoma, an aggressive form of brain cancer.

White House spokesman Raj Shah said Monday that Sadler had been “dealt with internally.” But he refused to say how.

Pressed repeatedly on the issue at a briefing, Shah said Sadler apologized privately to the McCain family and still remains in her position.

But Shah, who led the meeting in which Sadler made the comment, declined to say whether any disciplinary steps had been taken. He said he could not discuss how the situation was “addressed internally” because then it would no longer be internal.

McCain left Washington in December and few expect him to return.

Sadler called the Arizona Republican’s daughter Meghan McCain, a co-host of ABC’s “The View,” to apologize last week, Meghan McCain told ABC News.


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