John McCain: Delegates can "make up their own minds"
As delegates make a last-ditch effort for their freedom to vote against presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump at the party's convention this summer, Arizona Sen. John McCain seemed to back them in their bid against the billionaire businessman.
"I think it's up to every delegate to make up their own minds," McCain, the Republican party's 2008 presidential nominee, told The Weekly Standard in an interview Tuesday.
"I do not tell them what to do, I never have," he said.
McCain has said he faces a tough re-election campaign for his Arizona seat because of Trump, who the senator said has alienated Hispanic voters in his state.
Several delegates have recently mounted a challenge to the convention rules, saying they should be unbound and able to freely cast ballots against Trump if they choose.
Virginia delegate Beau Correll -- who is bound by state law to vote for Trump, the winner of Virginia's primary contest -- even filed a federal lawsuit last week seeking that right, telling CBS News that "Donald Trump does not exhibit the judgment, the competency for the highest office in the land."
Other high-profile Republicans have also come out in support of delegates who wish to make up their own minds at the convention, including former Trump rival and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker.
"I think historically, not just this year, delegates are and should be able to vote the way they see fit," Walker said last week.
The GOP, however, has pushed back against the "Never Trump" efforts to unbind delegates.
The Republican National Committee's chief strategist, Sean Spicer, wrote in a tweet last week that "there is no organized effort, strategy or leader of this so-called movement."