John McCain has taken what some are suggesting is a final jab at President Trump by having a Russian dissident serve as one of his pallbearers.
According to Politico, McCain planned his own funeral and chose to include Vladimir Kara-Murza as one of the men who will carry his coffin during the memorial service that will be held at the Washington National Cathedral.
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Trump has famously been supportive of Russian President Vladimir Putin, much to the dismay of many of his peers in Washington.
Kara-Murza, on the other hand, has been proudly outspoken against Putin, and has even survived two poisonings thought to be linked to his criticism of the Russian government.
He and McCain were bonded by their mutual opinions of Putin and consistently supported each other publicly. Their relationship grew to be so important to McCain that it ultimately led him to ask Kara-Murza to honor him by carrying his casket.
“I was speechless and heartbroken, close to tears at that moment,” Kara-Murza told the outlet, recalling when McCain first posed the question. “I said yes, of course, and that it would be the most heartbreaking honor that anyone could think of.”
Interestingly, in the days following McCain’s death, Kara-Murza wrote about the late Senator in a Washington Post article and boasted that he “saw through Vladimir Putin better than anyone.”
“Foresight is not necessarily a commodity in politics. Neither — looking at the political world today — are integrity or willingness to stand up for principle,” he added. “Such people are often dismissed as naive and impractical idealists.”
“McCain was an idealist, and was proud of it,” Kara-Murza continued. “He believed in his principles and was prepared to stand on them — regardless of party, convenience, or political advantage.”
He went on to assert that while “much has and will be written about McCain’s military courage, his patriotism, his famed bipartisanship and his unimpeachable personal decency,” it is “his long-standing position on Russia” that “deserves a special tribute.”
Kara-Murza then included a quote from McCain given during an awards ceremony speech in 2015.
“[These] people . . . are the enemies of the Russian people. They rob Russia of its wealth, its hopes, its future. They deny the God-given dignity of the people they misrule,” McCain said of the current Russian leadership. “They are thieves and murderers. And they are cowards. They fear justice. They fear truth. They fear a society in which ideals and morality are the foundation of law and order.”
As has been widely reported, McCain passed away on Saturday, Aug. 25 after a roughly year-long battle with terminal cancer. Memorial services have been held in his honor across the nation this week with his burial scheduled for Sunday, Sept. 2.
