Donald Trump Twitter: Mika Brzezinski responds to president's 'Crazy Mika' and 'bleeding face-lift' insults

Trump recalled a Mar-a-Lago anecdote while making caustic comments about MSNBC's Morning Joe show on Twitter

Mika Brzezinski, host of MSNBC's Morning Joe breakfast show, appears to have responded to Donald Trump's acidic criticism of her on Twitter with a similarly anatomical jab.

"I heard poorly rated @Morning_Joe speaks badly of me (don't watch anymore). Then how come low I.Q. Crazy Mika, along with Psycho Joe, came.." Trump wrote in his opening insult tweet Thursday morning (sic).

He continued: "...to Mar-a-Lago 3 nights in a row around New Year's Eve, and insisted on joining me. She was bleeding badly from a face-lift. I said no!"

About 20 minutes after the president's tweet, Brzezinski posted a photo of a box of Cheerios emblazoned with the slogan: 'Made For Little Hands' - presumably a reference to Trump who is often ridiculed for having abnormally small hands.

Brzezinski's co-host Joe Scarborough, a former Republican congressman who was also targeted in Trump's tweet and called a "psycho", responded by retweeting this observation from CNN's Jake Tapper:

He also retweeted NBC's Michael Beschloss, who wrote: "George Washington wrote John Adams in 1789 that a President of the United States must 'maintain the dignity of Office,'" and Mark Kornblau who added: "Never imagined a day when I would think to myself, 'it is beneath my dignity to respond to the President of the United States.'", while also drawing attention to an old GIF of Trump mocking a disabled reporter.

Outnumbered host Meghan McCain, employed by the generally Trump-friendly Fox News, was fiercely critical of the tweet:

As was Republican senator Lindsey Graham, who branded the POTUS's words "beneath the office":

The president is an avid breakfast TV viewer, tweeting about it seemingly as much as he does healthcare or foreign policy.

He guested on Morning Joe several times while campaigning, but clearly the show has fallen out of favour with Trump since he took office.

He is now very much allied to rival Fox breakfast show Fox & Friends, tweeting about topics it happens to be discussing that morning and occasionally being interviewed on it.

The New York Times' White House Correspondent Glenn Thrush reported that two Republican Capitol Hill staffers were questioning the sense of Trump attacking a woman on Twitter, when it is the support of female senators like Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins that the president needs to pass his floundering healthcare bill. They opposed it this week, causing the Senate vote to fall apart, due in part to the fact it de-funds Planned Parenthood.

While Trump suggested in his tweet that he declined to meet Brzezinski and Scarborough on the night in question, CNN reports that he did in fact have a private chat with them.

It also noted that photos from Mar-a-Lago do not show any blood or bandages on Brzezinski's face.