Jimmy McCain, the youngest son of late Republican Senator John McCain, told CNN on Tuesday that he plans to vote for Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris in the 2024 election.
Jimmy McCain, a first lieutenant who serves as an Army intelligence officer in the 158th Infantry Regiment, also said he has changed his voter registration to Democrat.
The interview with McCain comes amid an ongoing war of words between the Harris and Donald Trump campaigns over military matters.
Trump was criticized last week after his campaign staff got into an altercation with an Arlington National Cemetery staff member who was trying to prevent them from taking video footage at a grave site, which the cemetery confirmed would be a violation of federal law.
Trump's campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung insulted the unidentified staff member, telling Newsweek they were "suffering from a mental health episode," while another campaign official, Chris LaCivita, called the staff member a "despicable individual" who "does not deserve to represent the [hallowed] grounds of Arlington National Cemetery."
Military officials said the staffer, a woman, declined to press charges because she feared retaliation from Trump's supporters.
Trump's campaign later released a campaign video on TikTok using the footage from the memorial.
McCain's grandfather and great-grandfather are both buried at Arlington.
"It just blows me away," McCain, 34, told CNN. "These men and women that are laying in the ground there have no choice" of whether to be a backdrop for a political campaign, he said.
"I just think that for anyone who's done a lot of time in their uniform, they just understand that inherently — that it's not about you there. It's about these people who gave the ultimate sacrifice in the name of their country."
Jimmy McCain is the first member of the McCain family to officially abandon the Republican party, which ran his father as its nominee just 16 years ago. However, his mother, Cindy McCain, and his sister, Meghan McCain, have consistently decried Trump and his Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement.
Jimmy McCain told CNN he "would get involved in any way I could" to help the Harris campaign.
In his interview with Tapper, McCain was asked about his father's 1999 presidential campaign ad during his push for the Republican nomination against George W. Bush.
Trailing in the polls, the former prisoner of war in Vietnam produced a campaign ad highlighting his military career as a Navy pilot. At one moment, the ad showed McCain walking through Arlington National Cemetery.
The Army promptly clarified that there was no record of McCain's campaign seeking approval for filming in the cemetery. Even if such a request had been made, it would have been rejected due to the Army's prohibition of partisan activity on its installations, as noted by an Army representative. The campaign spokesperson explained that the footage was captured during one of the Senator's routine visits to his father's and grandfather's graves.
The McCain campaign pulled the ad, and the Senator admitted "a very bad mistake."
To a question from Tapper about whether an apology from Trump would make a difference for him, Jimmy McCain said:
"Yes. I mean, the first thing about, you know, John McCain, you don't spend that long in politics without messing up once or twice. So, and the main point is that he pulled it down and he understood the solemn, you know, like sanctified nature of that, of Arlington National Cemetery. So, if Donald Trump pulled it down and apologized, I mean, it would be the right thing to do. But look at his history towards veterans. Look, at this point, you know, I don't know what else he has to do, you know? The answer's no."
Jimmy McCain perceives Trump's previous assaults on his father — labeling him as "not a war hero" due to his capture in Vietnam, and allegedly calling the elder McCain a "loser" — as intensely injurious on a personal level. However, he believes these weren't politically transgressive.
"One thing about John McCain is that he chose a public life," McCain said. "So, to attack him is really not out of the realm of his job description."
Jim McCain: One of the main points of switching over is that I feel that Kamala Harris and Tim Walz embody a group of people that will help make this country better, that will take us forward. And that's really what matters at the end of the day.. pic.twitter.com/nyu47dJ0dH
— Acyn (@Acyn) September 3, 2024
Newsweek reached out to the Trump and Harris campaigns via email for comment.
Progressive veterans' group VoteVets is applying even more heat to the Trump campaign amid the Arlington backlash.
The group has released a new attack-ad on Donald Trump, listing the presidential candidate's long history of alleged and confirmed insults to veterans. Among them is the broadside that Trump originally leveled against the elder McCain in 2015, saying he "liked people who weren't captured," referring to McCain's years spent as a prisoner of war in Vietnam.
"We've got Trump on the run. Scared, his insults about service members catching up with him, he's panicked," the ad opens.
The ad was posted on X, formerly Twitter, on Friday and had been viewed 617,000 times by Monday morning.
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Update: 09/03/2024, 6:07 p.m. ET: This article has been updated with more information.
Correction: 09/03/2024, 4:40 p.m. ET: This article has been updated to correct Jimmy McCain's current branch of service. Jimmy McCain currently serves in the Army.
