GOP lawmakers cringe over Trump’s effort to destroy DeSantis 

Posted on (Updated by Alexander Bolton

Senate Republicans are wincing over former President Trump's early barrage of attacks against his chief rival, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), fearing they’re seeing a preview of a brutal primary to come that could leave both candidates weakened heading into the general election.  

GOP lawmakers acknowledge DeSantis needs to show he can take a punch and aren’t shocked Trump would take hard shots at a rival as the campaign heats up.

But some are surprised the former president is unloading such a heavy barrage before DeSantis is even in the race, and they worry that getting into a yearlong mudslinging battle with Trump isn't good look for the party heading into 2024.   

“I winced in 2016 and I’m wincing now,” said Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.) when asked about Trump’s hardball tactics. “That’s just because that’s not my style. 

“I don’t think you’ll ever take the New York style out of Donald Trump. It’s too much to ask, he’s a fully-baked cake,” she said.  

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), who won reelection in 2022 despite casting one of seven Republican votes to convict Trump of an impeachment charge in February 2021, signaled she’s not happy about the vitriol Trump is already unleashing in the primary.  

“Why anyone feels it’s necessary as part of a campaign to be nasty and personal is beyond me. It doesn’t have to be. Talk about the issues,” she said.  

Trump has already settled on a nickname for the Florida governor: Ron DeSanctimonious.  

Some GOP lawmakers worry that Trump attacking DeSantis before the Florida governor has even officially entered the race will hurt the party heading into 2024. (Associated Press)

Last month he flagged a photo on his social media platform, Truth Social, that allegedly showed DeSantis posing with three young women while drinking an alcoholic beverage when he taught at boarding school 20 years ago.  

Trump claims that DeSantis cried in front of him while begging for his endorsement in the 2018 Florida gubernatorial primary, when he trailed his rival Adam Putman by double digits.

He said this week that he “probably” regrets endorsing DeSantis in the race.  

“He was dead as a dog; he was a dead politician. He would have been working, perhaps, for a law firm, or doing something else,” Trump told reporters who traveled with him to Iowa.  

Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.) said on Wednesday that he wished Trump would focus on drawing contrasts with Democrats on the issues instead of tearing down fellow Republicans. 

“That’s his style. If you’re going to be in the arena, you should expect that,” he said of Trump’s personal attacks on DeSantis.  

“Yes, I would like to keep it focused on the issues. I think there’s plenty to talk about, lots of contrasts you can draw with Democrats. I’d rather [they] keep their fire focused on them instead of each other,” he said.  

DeSantis has tried to focus on fighting what he calls “woke activism” in Florida and getting his agenda through the state legislature, but Trump is already aiming the heavy artillery at the governor.  

A super PAC aligned with Trump, Make America Great Again Inc., on Wednesday filed a complaint against DeSantis with the Florida Commission on Ethics, accusing the governor and his allies of running a “shadow presidential campaign.”  

Trump’s campaign this month starting buying Facebook ads promoting a picture of DeSantis sitting next to Trump in the Oval Office captioned: “An Apprentice Leaning from the Master” and “Re-elect President Trump in 2024.”  

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R)

DeSantis has put an emphasis in recent months on fighting "woke activism," despite the attention that Trump's attacks on him have drawn. (AP Photo/Lynne Sladky)

Speaking at an event in Davenport, Iowa, Monday, Trump accused DeSantis of wanting to “decimate” Social Security and compared him to Utah Sen. Mitt Romney (R), who voted twice to convict the former president on impeachment charges.  

He also accused DeSantis of being a Republican in name only and connected him to former Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), a Republican leader who for many Trump conservatives embodied the GOP establishment’s leeriness of Trump when he entered the White House in 2017.  

“You have to remember, Ron was a disciple of Paul Ryan, who is a RINO loser currently destroying FX, and would constantly vote against entitlements,” Trump said in Iowa. “And to be honest with you, Ron reminds me a lot of Mitt Romney.”  

Some Republicans worry relentless negativity on the campaign trail could wind up turning off swing voters, especially suburban women and college-educated voters. 

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) tacitly blamed Trump’s influence on the Republican Party’s brand for the disappointing performance of GOP Senate candidates in the 2022 midterm.  

“Here’s the problem, we underperformed among voters who did not like President Biden’s performance, among independents and among moderate Republicans, who looked at us and concluded [there was] too much chaos, too much negativity. And we turned off a lot of these centrist voters,” he told reporters in November.   

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), a counselor to the Senate GOP leadership team, said negative politics tend to backfire in North Carolina, a swing state that Trump carried in 2016 and 2020.  

He said he “never used it” and “never found it productive” to wield the politics of personal destruction to win a race.  

Trump appears to want to create a divide between DeSantis and the working-class and rural voters who largely make up his base. (Getty)

“I think it turns off a lot of people that are part of gettable votes for the Republican nominee,” he said.  

He emphasized he wouldn’t presume to give Trump political advice, but he cautioned that “I don’t think in a purple state like North Carolina it’s the best posture, the best message for suburban voters — the voters that we saw move the other way or not vote in the last election cycle.” 

Trump’s political strategy appears to be to drive a wedge between DeSantis and working-class and rural conservatives who don’t have college degrees and make up the core of Trump’s base.  

Some Senate Republicans privately speculate DeSantis will not be able to defeat Trump in next year’s primary unless he can make bigger inroads with rural, evangelical and working-class white voters without college degrees. Recent polls show Trump leading by large margins among this swath of the GOP primary electorate.  

GOP lawmakers say they expected a bruising race but some of them are marveling over how early the carpet bombing has started. 

“Whenever you’re going to have a hard-fought primary as opposed to something that has consensus, there’s going to be injury from the warfare,” said Sen. Mike Braun (R-Ind.). “It looks like it’s getting started very early.” 

McConnell’s hospitalization raises questions for GOP’s future

Posted on (Updated by Alexander Bolton

Senate Republicans found themselves shaken and disoriented Thursday after finding out their leader Sen. Mitch McConnell (Ky.) was in the hospital after tripping at a private event, raising questions about his health and future leadership of the GOP conference.  

McConnell, who in January became the longest serving party leader in Senate history, has led the Senate GOP conference since 2005 and has helped guide his colleagues through some of the biggest moments in recent history — the 2008 financial collapse, the near default of the U.S. government in 2011, the fiscal cliff of 2012, the two impeachment trials of former President Trump and the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.

McConnell fell after attending a private dinner at the Waldorf Astoria in Washington and was taken to the hospital by an ambulance and is being treated for a concussion. 

The 81-year-old Kentucky senator’s sudden absence came only a day after he helped Republicans achieve a big political victory by stampeding Democrats into voting to block a District of Columbia crime bill. And it left some GOP senators feeling unsettled and worried about the future.

“I am a huge fan of Mitch McConnell. I think he has the ability to lead a very diverse group of individuals in a way that is masterful,” said one GOP senator who requested anonymity to discuss the impact of McConnell’s injury on the Senate GOP conference.  

“I think, who would be our next leader and what kind of leader would that person be?” the senator added. “Yeah, I do worry about that.”  

“He’s always thinking ahead in terms of initiatives. He’s thinking about how the players on his team can fit. He’s got a knack for that that I don’t think you find in many others,” the lawmaker said.

Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.), former Senate GOP Whip John Cornyn (Texas) and Senate Republican Conference Chairman John Barrasso (Wyo.) are viewed as McConnell’s three most likely successors. 

But there hasn’t been any serious discussion of a future Senate GOP leadership race among Republican senators themselves because McConnell has a secure grip on the job and hasn’t dropped any hint about planning to retire.

He easily defeated former National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman Rick Scott (Fla.) by a lopsided vote of 37 to 10 when Scott tried to capitalize on Republican disappointment over the 2022 midterm election by challenging McConnell for the top job.  

Scott, who has feuded with McConnell over party strategy since that race, tweeted on Thursday that he and his wife are keeping the leader and his family “in our prayers” and wished him “a speedy recovery.”

Senators were in the dark

The news that broke Wednesday night that McConnell had been rushed to the hospital after tripping and falling at a dinner event left Republican senators scrambling the next morning for more information about the severity of his injuries.

Speculation veered in all different directions, and the lack of details from McConnell’s office had lawmakers wondering about how bad the situation was.

McConnell’s top deputies, Thune and Cornyn, didn’t get a chance to talk to their leader before being pressed for details by reporters in the Capitol’s hallways.  

Thune, looking somber Thursday morning, only said: “Don’t know a lot yet.”  

Thune rushed straight to the floor before taking any other questions to be sure he first addressed his Senate colleagues, telling them that his “thoughts and prayers are with Leader McConnell” as well as “with his family” and “with his team.”  

Cornyn was also in the dark.

“I understand that he’s resting up, but I don’t have any details,” he said.  

McConnell’s office disclosed at lunchtime Thursday that he was being treated for a concussion and would remain in the hospital for a few days of observation and treatment.

What exactly happened

As the day went on, a few other details leaked out about the accident.  

McConnell was at the Waldorf earlier in the evening to attend a reception for the Senate Leadership Fund, the super PAC that he is affiliated with and that played a major role in the last election by spending $290 million.

The reception was a thank-you event for the super PAC’s supporters, and several GOP senators attended. 

“I think it was more of a thank you to the people that had helped with the fund in the last election cycle,” said Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska). “It was a pretty good showing of Republican colleagues. I don’t know how many showed up, but it seemed like there was a lot of us.”  

McConnell later attended a small, private dinner that a person familiar described as “adjacent” to the reception. He tripped and fell after that dinner.

McConnell's significant impact

A second Republican senator who requested anonymity to discuss the sensitive topic said McConnell’s hospitalization raises questions about the future leadership of the Senate GOP conference but emphasized, “It’s not time to be talking about [it].” 

“My thoughts and prayers are with Elaine and Mitch, and I hope it’s not too serious,” the senator said, referring to McConnell’s wife, former Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao. 

“I haven’t found anything good about getting old,” the senator quipped.  

McConnell has been such a major political force in Republican politics for so long that his GOP colleagues have come to rely on his ability to pump huge sums of money into Senate battleground states and to insulate them from the turbulence in conservative politics that has roiled the House GOP conference.  

He leadership is especially valued by mainstream and moderate Republicans such as Sen. Susan Collins (Maine) — one of McConnell’s closest friends in the Senate — because he gives them space to work with Democratic colleagues and practice the style of Republican politics they see as best suited to their home states. 

Colleagues also value McConnell’s ability to get their party out of tough political situations.  

One example came in the fall of 2021, when he rounded up his leadership team and other allies to provide the 11 GOP votes needed to pave the way for Democrats to pass legislation to raise the debt limit.  

McConnell took enormous heat from Trump and other critics for the vote, but it took the danger of a federal default off the table.  

And McConnell has historically shown a willingness to inject himself in Senate Republican primary politics to pave the way for candidates he views as the most electable in a general election — an approach he adopted after Republicans fumbled away their chances to win seats in Delaware, Nevada, Missouri and Indiana in the 2010 and 2012 elections.  

Even senators who voted to oust him from his leadership job in November admit their respect and admiration for his toughness in battle.  

“He’s a tough old crow. My money’s on him,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.). 

McCarthy’s Tucker Carlson decision ‘despicable,’ says Schumer

Posted on (Updated by Alexander Bolton

Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) on Tuesday said that Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s (R-Calif.) decision to share security footage from the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol exclusively with Fox News host Tucker Carlson was “despicable” and damaging to security.  

Asked whether he would share the security footage of the attack, some of which was aired publicly during former President Trump’s 2021 impeachment hearing and during the hearings of the House select Jan. 6 committee, he said it would need to be reviewed by experts.  

“Look, I think what McCarthy did was despicable, damaged our security,” Schumer said of his House Republican counterpart. “Certainly … when he listens to a small group of the MAGA right, he’s going to run into trouble himself.” 

“As for releasing it, security has to be the No. 1 concern,” he said.  

McCarthy decided last week to grant Carlson access to all of the Capitol’s security footage from Jan. 6, sparking widespread controversy given Carlson’s work on a 2021 documentary series that framed the attack on the Capitol as a “false flag” operation intended to turn public opinion against former President Trump and his supporters.  

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) on Tuesday dodged a question about whether he agreed with McCarthy’s decision to share sensitive footage with Carlson, who entertained Trump’s claims of a stolen election on his show while privately expressing extreme skepticism about them.  

“Going back to when Speaker [Nancy] Pelosi [D-Calif.] was Speaker, my main concern is the security of the Capitol,” the GOP leader said tersely.  

Asked if sharing the footage may compromise Capitol security, McConnell reiterated “security of the Capitol,” which he said “was obviously severely threatened on Jan. 6” was his top concern.  

Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-Ga.), the chair of the House Administration Subcommittee on Oversight, said Tuesday that footage from Jan. 6 would be subject to a security review before going to Fox News.  

“It’s basically controlled access to be able to view tapes. Can’t record, can’t take anything with you. Then they will request any particular clips that — that they may need, and then we’ll make sure that there’s nothing sensitive, nothing classified — you know, escape routes,” Loudermilk said in response to a question from The Hill. 

Emily Brooks contributed.  

Trump’s polling strength causes heartburn for Senate GOP

Posted on (Updated by Alexander Bolton

A Fox News survey showing former President Trump leading Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis by 15 points among Republican presidential primary voters is the latest cause for heartburn among Senate Republicans who don't think Trump can win a general election match-up against President Biden.  

Predictions by key Senate Republicans that Trump would fade as the 2024 election approached are being upended, putting pressure on party leaders in Washington to consider embracing the former president once again.  

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and other Republicans blamed the “chaos” surrounding Trump for the party’s disappointing performance in the 2022 midterm election. Some thought it would be the final straw to keep Trump off the presidential ticket next year.

And McConnell had privately told several Senate GOP colleagues that Trump’s political strength would fade the more time he spent outside the Oval Office, according to two Republican senators who spoke to The Hill.  

Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.)

Minority Leader Mitch McConnell told Senate GOP colleagues that former President Trump's political strength would fade the longer he was out of office. (Greg Nash)

Yet a Fox News poll of 1,006 registered voters nationwide found Trump leading DeSantis 43 percent to 28 percent among GOP primary voters in a hypothetical match-up.  

Republican strategists say the poll shows Trump is more resilient than many party insiders expected. And they warn that Republican senators and other party establishment figures who have ramped up their criticism of Trump since he lost the 2020 election would be wise to carefully reconsider his chances of winning the presidential nomination next year.     

“I think Trump’s position is stronger than I thought it was,” said Vin Weber, a GOP strategist and former member of the House GOP leadership.  

He cited reports Trump has put together a more professional campaign operation than what he had previously.  

“If those articles are true, then Trump is running a very different campaign than he ran in 2016 or 2020. A formidable campaign with a disciplined candidate and 15-point lead in the polls today is more important than just a 15-point lead in the polls,” he said.  

Weber said “whatever doubts people may have about Trump’s inevitability … that should not be confused with a presumption that he’s not going to win.”  

“I think the Republicans that proceed on the assumption that Donald Trump will not be our candidate are taking a huge risk,” he added.  

A recent Fox News poll has former President Trump leading Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis 43 to 28 percent in a hypothetical matchup. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson)

Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.), who has criticized Trump from time to time and faced the former president’s wrath as a result, acknowledged Monday Trump still has a good chance of winning the party’s presidential nomination.  

“I think it’s possible he could be the nominee but I also think there are other people who could be the nominee. It’s very early on. The field isn’t even close to being set,” he said. 

Asked if he is surprised by Trump’s political resilience, Thune responded, “he’s got a very loyal, hardcore base of support and the other candidates aren’t that well known yet.” 

Sen. John Cornyn (Texas), a member of the Senate GOP leadership team, said national polls don’t necessarily reflect how Trump will do in individual state contests — but the polling shows he could do well if GOP votes are split among many candidates.

“National polls don’t mean to much,” he said. “I just don’t think we know who’s going to be in contention. If there are a lot of people running, that probably will benefit President Trump.”  

Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.)

Sen. John Thune (Greg Nash)

One Republican senator who requested anonymity to discuss the GOP presidential primary pointed out that Trump has maintained a solid lead among white working-class conservative voters who don’t have college degrees.  

“DeSantis’s problem is this: Trump still has self-identified very conservative primary voters and working-class voters, folks who don’t have a four-year college degree. He has really substantial leads among those folks,” the senator said.  

“When you break down DeSantis’s support, it’s almost from self-identified moderates and then Never-Trumpers, which is fine but you’re not going to win a primary with that. So he’s got to make some inroads,” the senator added.  

The Fox poll found Trump beating DeSantis by double digits among white Republican voters without a college degree, primary voters earning less than $50,000, white rural voters and white evangelical voters.

DeSantis led Trump 37 percent to 30 percent among white GOP voters with college degrees and they were virtually tied among suburban GOP voters, according to the survey. 

NBC News reported Monday that DeSantis will skip the Conservative Political Action Conference in Maryland this week, a large annual gathering of conservative activists.  

“It’s clear that Trump is the front-runner and Republicans in Washington need to get used to that idea,” Brian Darling, a GOP strategist and former Senate aide, said. 

“The Fox News poll does indicate that Ron DeSantis is a very strong candidate but that’s it. None of the other candidates are showing the strength to challenge Trump,” he said. “Right now, the race is Donald Trump’s to lose. 

“If you’re [New Hampshire Gov.] Chris Sununu or [former Maryland Gov.] Larry Hogan or [former South Carolina Gov.] Nikki Haley, these polls are not good news for you,” he added. 

Darling said Trump's critics in the party establishment are feeling heartburn over the former president's popularity with GOP voters. 

"He is showing more strength as he gets more active which should give the congressional delegation of Never Trumpers some pause," he added. "He's always going to have that very strong base of support."

But Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), who was one of seven Senate Republicans to vote to convict Trump on an impeachment charge related to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, said he still doesn’t think the former president can win a general election.  

“The issue is, 'Can he win?' and I don’t think he can,” he said. “Under President Trump, we lost the House, we lost the presidency and then we lost the Senate.” 

Cassidy attributed Trump’s lead in the polls to name recognition but emphasized “ultimately it comes down to, ‘Can you win?’ and over six years we’ve learned no.” 

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.)

Sen. Bill Cassidy said he doesn't think former President Trump can win a general election. (Greg Nash)

Still, the Fox poll is the latest of a long string of national polls showing Trump with a comfortable lead over DeSantis, despite an unceasing flood of unflattering media reports about Trump’s legal problems and jabs from former members of his inner circle, such as former Vice President Mike Pence and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.  

Trump has a comfortable 13-point lead over DeSantis in the national polling average calculated by RealClearPolitics.com.  

A Harvard Center for American Political Studies—Harris Poll survey of 1,838 registered voters last month showed Trump ahead of DeSantis by 23 points while a Reuters/Ipsos poll showed Trump with a 12-point lead over DeSantis in early February. 

Jim McLaughlin, Trump’s pollster, said polls are “consistent” in showing that Trump is the clear front-runner for the nomination.  

“President Trump’s unique selling point is he has the ability to say, ‘You know all these problems you have right now, whether it’s the economy, it’s inflation, it’s immigration, it’s war and peace? I solved all this stuff, we didn’t have those problems.’ Every day he looks better and better versus Joe Biden,” he said.  

McLaughlin said “one of the reasons DeSantis has the popularity that he has is because he’s viewed as Donald Trump,” pointing to the tough-guy approach DeSantis has taken with the media and other liberal causes as well as Trump’s pivotal endorsement of DeSantis in the 2018 Florida governor’s race.  

Explaining Trump’s greater popularity among Republican base voters including non-college educated White, evangelical and rural voters, McLaughlin said “it’s like why would want to go to Trump-lite, which is what they view DeSantis as, when I can get the real thing in Donald Trump.” 

“It’s the old Coke versus New Coke, people want their old Coke,” he added. “They look at Trump and said he did this stuff, he solved these problems.” 

Senate GOP pours cold water on idea of impeaching Biden

Posted on (Updated by Alexander Bolton

Senate Republicans are pouring cold water on the idea that President Biden’s classified documents controversy rises to the level of an impeachable offense, heading off House conservatives looking for revenge after former President Trump’s two trials.

Even before Tuesday’s revelation that about a dozen classified documents had been found at former Vice President Mike Pence’s Indiana home, GOP senators were cool to the idea of impeachment. 

“I don’t think you want to get into where it’s a tit for tat, every two years or four years you’re dealing with impeachment proceedings in the House and Senate,” Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.) told The Hill. “There has to be a really good reason, obviously, the constitutional reasons and grounds for that. So we’ll see where it goes.” 

Asked whether Biden’s possession of classified documents has the potential to rise to the level of an impeachable offense, Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), an adviser to the Senate GOP leadership team, gave a simple answer: “No.” 

Many Republicans thought the Democrats’ first impeachment of Trump over delaying military aide to Ukraine was a partisan overreach. But that means they are also wary of doing the same thing now that their party has the House majority.

It’s just one of several tension points emerging between Republicans in the two chambers.  

Senate Republicans have mostly ignored chatter in the House about impeaching Biden’s secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandro Mayorkas, or wiping out the tax code and replacing it with a 23 percent to 30 percent national sales tax. 

Some Republicans think talk of impeaching Biden will grow in the House, even though GOP senators warn that it’s a bad idea. 

House Republicans introduced more than a dozen impeachment resolutions against Biden in the last Congress, and the GOP-controlled House Judiciary Committee has already initiated an investigation of Biden’s handling of classified documents, which could lay the ground for future impeachment proceedings.  

Trump has also come under criticism for a separate classified documents controversy, but House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) in an interview with Fox Business argued that Biden’s handling of classified documents was more egregious because the former Republican president at least secured the classified information he held with padlocks.

“That’s much different than what we’re finding now with President Biden, and I think it is severely going to cause him a great deal of trouble in the future as we get more of the truth,” McCarthy told Fox host Larry Kudlow. 

A few Senate Republicans entertain the idea that the classified documents found at Biden’s Delaware home and former Washington, D.C., office would lead to a Senate impeachment trial. 

“This actually might be an impeachable offense. If there’s a high crime and misdemeanor standard, which there is, this is the closest thing to one in recent years,” said Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.). “If the special counsel comes up with anything, realizing [Biden’s] a sitting president, I suppose they could draft up what would become articles of impeachment, depending on what they find.” 

Cramer said “I personally hate impeachments” but thinks the standard has changed since House Democrats impeached Trump in 2019 after he held up aid to Ukraine to use as leverage to get Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate Biden’s family’s business dealings in the country.  

Only one Republican senator, Mitt Romney (Utah), voted to convict on an article of impeachment during Trump’s 2020 Senate trial.  

Cramer said “Democrats created an impeachment cycle and we may be in that cycle,” calling Trump’s first impeachment “far-fetched and silly.”  

He said House Republicans now need to decide whether they want to keep the impeachment bar as low as they believe Democrats set it in 2019 or whether to elevate it to cover only the most serious crimes.  

The documents found at Pence’s home would further muddy any attempt to argue that Biden’s possession of classified documents meets the standard of high crimes and misdemeanors. 

Romney on Tuesday said it will be hard for House Republicans to credibly push an article of impeachment against Biden for keeping classified documents at his Delaware home after Pence admitted the same transgression.  

“I can’t imagine that’s where it’s going to head with so many people in the same arena,” he said.  

Some key Senate Republicans, such as Senate Intelligence Committee Vice Chairman Marco Rubio (Fla.), are already on record downplaying Trump’s possession of classified documents at his Florida home as a “storage” issue.  

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on Tuesday dismissed a question about whether Biden’s possession of classified documents could rise to the level of an impeachable offense.  

“I don’t have an answer to that hypothetical. I do think that the Justice Department seems to be willing to treat everybody the same and to try to retrieve the documents, and obviously it’s not a great idea to take classified documents away from the archives. We’ll see how they continue to handle it,” he said.   

Republican senators say it should be up to Robert Hur, the special counsel appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland, to decide whether Biden should be charged with a crime, not House Republicans, who filed more than a dozen articles of impeachment against Biden in the last Congress.  

“It could be a criminal offense,” Cornyn said. “That’s what the special counsel is for. Mishandling classified materials is very serious.”   

Garland appointed special counsel Jack Smith in November to oversee the Justice Department’s investigation of Trump’s handling of classified documents and whether he unlawfully interfered with the 2021 transfer of presidential power.  

Cornyn, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, blasted some Democrats for “hypocrisy” by trying to minimize Biden’s culpability after hammering Trump for months after the FBI searched Mar-a-Lago in August to retrieve classified documents.  

“The thing that’s made this such a story is the hypocrisy, [Democrats] attacking Trump,” he said. “Nobody should take classified materials outside of a secure facility, period.”   

Sen. Mike Braun (R-Ind.) said fellow Republicans should “be careful” about “knee-jerking to impeachment.”  

“I think the country will fatigue of that,” he said, pointing out that recent impeachment proceedings against former Presidents Clinton and Trump “have not ended up with any real result.”  

“If you start doing it on everything, I think it would be bad politically and for the mechanics of government working,” he said.  

Democrats picked up five House seats in the 1998 midterm elections as the Republican majority was in the midst of gearing up to impeach Clinton, marking a rare instance when the president’s party picked up House seats in the middle of a second term.  

Republicans picked up 14 House seats in the 2020 election after Democrats impeached Trump at the end of 2019.

Democrats express alarm over Biden classified docs: ‘I’m very concerned’

Posted on (Updated by Alexander Bolton

Democrats are expressing alarm over President Biden’s classified documents controversy, with some criticizing the president as diminished in stature and his staff as irresponsible.

“I’m very concerned,” said Sen. Jon Tester (Mont.), one of several incumbent Democrats who face potentially difficult reelection races next year in reliably GOP states in presidential elections.

“We have to get to the bottom of it to find out what the hell happened, why it happened,” he said.

“This is about national security,” Tester added, saying investigators need to find out if “it put our national security at risk.”

Biden’s January has been submerged in revelation after revelation of classified documents found at his former office and home. Most recently, 11 more documents were found during a search at Biden’s Wilmington, Del., home on Friday.

The drip-drip-drip nature of the findings has left Democrats and Republicans alike wondering whether there will be more documents found and has left the White House looking off-balance at times.

Biden emerged from the 2022 midterms in a stronger position after Democrats gained a seat in the Senate and held down their losses in the House. Democrats still see Biden as their most likely standard-bearer, and lawmakers in his party have been quick to contrast his handling of classified documents with former President Trump — who is dealing with his own controversy.

At the same time, there’s little doubt the issue has raised some questions for Biden and the White House just as his team prepared to move forward with an expected presidential announcement later this year.

Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), who like Tester is up for reelection next year in a state that Trump won easily in 2020, blasted the lax handling of secret information as “unbelievable” and “totally irresponsible.”

Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va.

Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., on Sept. 20, 2022. (AP Photo/Mariam Zuhaib, File)

Biden’s attempt to dismiss the building scandal last week by asserting “there’s no there there” also drew a barb from Manchin.

He told CNN on Monday “that’s just not a good statement,” adding “we just don’t know” what secrets may have been compromised.

Criticism from Manchin is hardly unheard of, but Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), who represents a safer state for Democrats, was also somewhat critical on Sunday. He said the controversy “diminishes” Biden and noted the president rightly felt “embarrassed by the situation.”

Sen. Richard Durbin (D-Ill.)

Sen. Richard Durbin (D-Ill.) on November 15, 2022. (Greg Nash)

Durbin on Monday said of the White House: “They were not careful in handling classified documents.”

“When I think of how we deal with them in the Capitol in comparison, whoever was responsible for it didn’t follow the basic rules,” Durbin said of the handling of classified documents.

Durbin said he never took a classified document out of his office, “let alone out of the building.”

Yet Durbin, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, stopped short of speculating whether Biden committed a potential crime, telling reporters: “I wouldn’t go that far.”

House Republicans are saber-rattling over the issue, signaling they intend to use their newly won oversight powers to look into the Biden documents story in a more aggressive way than they looked into Trump’s controversy.

Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), the new chair of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee, has requested that the Secret Service hand over all the information it has on visitors to Biden’s Delaware home in the time since he served as vice president.

The request — made to Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle on Monday — came after Comer demanded that visitor logs for the residence be turned over. The White House said last week that such records do not exist.

Later on Monday, White House counsel Stuart Delery wrote to Comer that the administration does not have possession of the documents the National Archives and Department of Justice have taken as part of the investigation into Biden’s handling of classified materials.

Delery pledged to “accommodate legitimate oversight interests” in response to Comer’s request.

One GOP strategist said Republicans will go after Biden aggressively given the Trump controversy.

“The House is going to have a field day with investigations because of the fact that the Biden administration has been so outspoken criticizing Trump for the exact thing,” said Brian Darling, a former Senate aide.

Darling said the House could vote on articles of impeachment if the special prosecutor or House investigators find Biden broken the law or jeopardized national security.

“It’s possible. It depends on how the hearings go in the House. I think it’s quite possible that there will be discussion about impeachment because Democrats seemed so open to the idea of impeachment against President Trump and we’ve seen a lot of the payback from many of the things that happened when Democrats controlled the House, like kicking members off committees,” he said.

Durbin told reporters he expects House Republicans to go overboard in trying to tear down Biden, just as they did when they tried to blame former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for the death of four Americans at a U.S. diplomatic post in Benghazi, Libya, in 2012.

Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.) said Biden’s possession of classified documents now effectively “completely neutralizes” Democratic attacks against Trump for holding sensitive material in Florida.

Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.)

Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) on Tuesday, November 29, 2022. (Greg Nash)

“I’m not sure I understand all the laws that pertain to classified documents. I know the procedures that apply, but it seems to me the Justice Department is going to have to sort all that out and I think right now it’s still an evolving situation,” he said.

Sen. Ron Wyden (Ore.), a senior Democrat on the Intelligence Committee, said the careful handling of classified documents should always be a top priority and declared: “All of the circumstances are going to be examined …. So there’s a message that nobody is above the law.” 

“The rule that I follow scrupulously is you don’t take documents out of the room,” he said. “Obviously there’s a lot of information coming out and I want to wait and see what the facts are. 

But Wyden also gave Biden some political cover by drawing a distinction with Trump.  

“One point that I don’t believe is in contention is President Biden has voluntarily cooperated and the former president did not,” he said. 

Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), who faces a competitive re-election in a Republican-leaning state, urged the administration to be as transparent as possible.  

“There’s nothing that’s betrayal of national interest, there’s nothing he’s trying to hide but they need to come out with all of it,” he said. “He’s got to deal with it and get it over with.” 

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) expressed frustration that the media attention surrounding the classified documents scandal threatens to eclipse the congressional agenda.  

“It’s being looked at to the nth degree,” he said. “I’m concerned that I think we’re wasting an awful lot of effort on something that has a special prosecutor look[ing] into it and at the end of the day it looks like all you’re going to find is some sloppiness. We have real problems to work on,” he said. 

Senate GOP rebukes Trump with Electoral Count Act

Posted on (Updated by Alexander Bolton

Eighteen Senate Republicans rebuked former President Trump this week by voting to clarify that the vice president does not have the power to overturn a presidential election as Trump pressured then-Vice President Mike Pence to do on Jan. 6, 2021.  

And several other Republicans, who didn't vote for the spending package, which included the electoral count reforms, such as Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), previously expressed support for changes to the law to make it tougher to object to the Electoral College's vote. 

GOP senators ignored Trump’s argument posted on Truth Social, his social media platform, that the 1887 Electoral Count Act should be left the way it is “in case of Fraud.”  

Republican senators across the political spectrum said they want to slam the door on the notion that Pence had the authority to throw out a state’s slate of electors, which could open the door for future vice presidents to attempt to interfere with the Electoral College’s vote. 

“The Electoral Count Act, that statute needed to be fixed and clarified,” Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.) said, referring to the 1887 law that Trump tried to exploit by arguing its ambiguity gave Pence an opening to halt the certification of Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 election.  

“A couple years ago there were a lot of questions raised about it. There wasn’t any question in my mind about what it said but since there are [questions], I think it’s important to nail that down,” he added.  

Thune and other Senate Republicans have called on Trump to drop his unceasing efforts to contest the results of the last presidential election, something they see as futile, divisive and harmful with independent voters.  

“We’re one election past 2020 and he still seems to be obsessed with that election. Obviously, I don’t think that’s good for him. It’s certainly not good for anybody else, which is why most of us have decided to move on,” Thune said.  

Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah), who voted twice to convict Trump on impeachment charges and helped lead the negotiations to reform the Electoral Count Act, said Trump “certainly wouldn’t want [Vice President] Kamala Harris to pick the next president, right?” 

Trump in a post on Truth Social Tuesday argued it is “probably better to leave” the Electoral Count Act “the way it is so that it can be adjusted in case of fraud.”  

And he also lashed out at Republican critics who argue that Pence never had the authority to halt the certification of Biden’s victory.  

“What I don’t like are the lies and ‘disinformation’ put out by the Democrats and RINOs. They said the vice president has ‘absolutely no choice,’ it was carved in ‘steel,’ but if he has no choice, why are they changing the law saying he has no choice?” Trump posted.  

Romney countered Trump by pointing out that argument would give Democrats, who now control the White House, the right to block a Republican from becoming president.  

“Let’s do something which he’s not fond of doing, which is taking that to the next logical conclusion. On that basis, that means that Kamala Harris would be able to choose the next president. Does he really think that’s the right way to go?” he said.  

The legislation states the vice president has solely a ministerial role in presiding over the joint session of Congress when lawmakers certify the results of the Electoral College. 

And it raises the threshold to lodge an objection to a slate of electors to one-fifth of the House and one-fifth of the Senate — limiting the ability of one or a few disgruntled lawmakers from drawing the chambers into extended debate over the results.  

It would also provide for expedited judicial review of legal challenges to slates of electors, putting the matter before a three-judge panel, and allow direct appeal to the Supreme Court.  

Trump urged Senate Republicans to vote against the omnibus package, which included the Electoral Count Act reforms, in a scathing video posted on his Truth Social social media platform. 

“Every single Republican should vote 'no' on the ludicrous, unacceptable $1.7 trillion omnibus spending bill. It’s a disaster for our country and it also happens to be a disaster for the Republican Party, because they could stop it,” he said.  

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), an adviser to the Senate Republican leadership team, applauded raising the threshold to raising an objection during a joint congressional session to a state’s electors. 

“The idea that one senator or one House member can create a process and some confusion when it comes to counting the electoral votes doesn’t make much sense,” he said. “Raising that threshold so that it just can’t be one off in each makes sense to me and it’s long overdue.”

Cornyn argued there was never any real doubt that Pence didn’t have the authority to overturn the results of the 2020 election. 

“We all knew that and we still know that, but I think this maybe restores a little bit of confidence and stability to the process and eliminate some of the uncertainty we saw on Jan. 6,” he said.  

The reforms to the Electoral Count Act are paired with the Presidential Transition Improvement Act, which is intended to ensure an orderly transfer of power after a presidential election — a reform aimed at Trump’s refusal to acknowledge Biden as the victor of the 2020 election.  

Trump’s appointed administrator of the General Services Administration initially refused to sign a letter allowing Biden’s transition team to receive millions of dollars to begin the transfer of power.  

The legislation would allow eligible candidates to receive transition resources during the limited time period during which the outcome of an election is in dispute and remove the General Services Administration’s administrator from having to determine the winner before releasing funds. 

If neither candidate concedes a race five days after an election, then both could access federal transition money.  

Trump lashed out at Democratic and Republican critics after Paul submitted an op-ed to the Louisville Courier-Journal expressing support for the reforms.  

Trump linked to Paul’s essay in which the senator argued that “recent elections uncovered defects in Congress’s interaction with the Electoral College” and that federal law “currently leaves ambiguous the role of the vice president.”  

Paul said the “political theater” of objecting to the Electoral College’s vote “went too far and culminated in a mob disrupting the joint session of Congress” on Jan. 6.  

One Republican senator familiar with the negotiations on the Electoral Count Act reforms said GOP lawmakers knew Trump was opposed to the changes but ignored him.  

“He’s against it, but we’ve consistently voted for things he’s against,” said the lawmaker, who noted that Trump opposed the $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill, bipartisan legislation to address gun violence, a compromise to raise the debt limit, and postal reform. 

Trump blasted the bipartisan gun bill as something that would “go down in history as the first step in the movement to TAKE YOUR GUNS AWAY.”  

But the GOP senator said Trump’s criticisms and threats are becoming background noise to many Republican senators who routinely ignore him.  

“We’re going to do what we think is best and not be intimidated,” the lawmaker said.  

Not all GOP senators, however, think the Electoral Count Act needs to be reformed. 

A few of Trump’s strongest allies and lawmakers, who are trying to appeal to his populist base of support, argued the law has worked fine for more than 100 years.  

“I’m against fiddling with that law. It’s been on the books now for a century and a half, it has governed all of the presidential elections in that timespan and I think it’s worked fine,” said Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.). “It looks like the first time Republicans use its provisions, the Democrat majority immediately changes it.” 

Thirty-one House Democrats and then-Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) objected in January 2005 to then-President George W. Bush’s victory in Ohio during the 2004 presidential election. And House Democrats objected to Trump’s victory in the 2016 election but failed to win any Senate support for the objection.  

Many Senate Republicans aren’t protecting Trump after Jan. 6 panel’s nod to criminal charges

Posted on (Updated by Alexander Bolton

Senate Republicans are stepping out of the way of the House Jan. 6 committee’s recommendation that the Justice Department prosecute former President Trump for crimes related to the 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol.

GOP senators, especially those allied with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), say the Jan. 6 committee interviewed “credible” witnesses and added to the historical record in a substantial way, even though they have qualms about how Democrats have tried to use the panel’s findings to score political points.  

Now they say it’s up to Attorney General Merrick Garland or Department of Justice special counsel Jack Smith to investigate or indict Trump, but they’re not waving federal prosecutors off from prosecuting the former president.  

“The entire nation knows who is responsible for that day,” McConnell said in a statement, pointing the finger squarely at Trump in response to the House Jan. 6 committee referring four criminal charges against Trump to the Justice Department.  

It was McConnell’s strongest statement blaming Trump for inciting a crowd to storm the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, since he denounced him on the Senate floor in February of that year.  

“The people who stormed this building believed they were acting on the wishes and instructions of their president,” he said in February 2021 after voting on technical grounds to acquit Trump during his second impeachment trial.  

Senate Minority Whip John Thune (R-S.D.) said, “It’s up to Justice now.”  

Asked if he thought the committee had conducted a credible investigation of Trump, Thune replied, “They interviewed some credible witnesses.” 

Thune said the makeup of the panel was partisan because it comprised seven Democrats and only two anti-Trump Republicans, but he acknowledged, “They did interview a lot of folks that had a lot of knowledge of what happened and they were people who I think were very credible.”

Retiring Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio), a member of McConnell’s leadership team, said the Jan. 6 committee’s final report, which will be made public Wednesday, is “important.” 

“I think the referrals are not as important as the report. The report’s important, even though it came out of a partisan process,” he said. 

“But the testimony is the testimony, and they were able to get the testimony from most of the people they wanted — not everybody but most — and I think most of the significant figures. That is the historical record,” Portman explained. “That’s very important.”  

The Jan. 6 panel on Monday made four criminal referrals alleging Trump incited insurrection, obstructed an official proceeding of Congress, conspired to defraud the United States and conspired to make a false statement.  

The referrals don’t require the Department of Justice to bring criminal charges against the former president, but they put more pressure on federal prosecutors to act.  

The panel also recommended the House Ethics Committee investigate House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and several allies — Reps. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), Scott Perry (R-Pa.) and Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) — and what they did in the lead-up to and on the day of the attack on the Capitol.  

House Republicans are expected to dismantle the Jan. 6 panel after they take control of the chamber in January.  

Trump shrugged off the criminal referrals in a statement posted to Truth Social, his social media platform.  

“These folks don’t get it that when they come after me, people who love freedom rally around me. It strengthens me. What doesn’t kill me makes me stronger,” he posted.  

Former President Trump speaks at an event

Trump has announced a new bid for the White House, but it’s been clear for weeks amid a series of controversies surrounding Trump and a disappointing midterm election outcome for the GOP that a number of Republican senators would rather move on from the former president.

Only one Republican senator, Sen. Tommy Tuberville (Ala.), has publicly endorsed Trump’s 2024 presidential bid.  

Others have raised concerns about Trump’s viability in the 2024 general election or blamed him for derailing their chances of winning key Senate races in Pennsylvania and Georgia this year.  

Republican senators speaking to the media on Monday did not entirely embrace the Jan. 6 panel, by any means, but most did not embrace Trump.

Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (W.Va.), another member of the Senate Republican leadership team, said she thought the Jan. 6 committee's investigation “was a political process” and that she had “never seen” Congress recommend the Justice Department prosecute someone before.  

But she added that Trump “bears some responsibility” for the attack on the U.S. Capitol.  

“I don’t see that this changes anything. Let’s get the Electoral Count Act passed. That will clear up some of the ambiguity that came about that day,” she said, referring to legislation the Senate will take up this week to clarify that the vice president has a solely ministerial role when Congress convenes in joint session to certify the results of a presidential election.  

The bill is intended to eliminate the possibility that a future president tries to get the vice president to throw out slates of electors when presiding over a joint session of Congress, as Trump pressured then-Vice President Mike Pence to do on Jan. 6.   

McConnell, Thune, Portman and Capito all voted to acquit Trump after his second impeachment trial when he was charged with inciting insurrection. 

Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.)

Many Senate Republicans, however, voted that way on technical grounds because Trump at the time of the trial was no longer in office.  

Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah), who voted to convict Trump in both of his impeachment trials, said, “There’s no question that President Trump deserves culpability for inciting the riot on Jan. 6 and for failure to act to protect the vice president and the Capitol of the United States.”

“Whether there are criminal charges associated with that would have to be determined by experienced prosecutors, and that’s what the Justice Department will determine,” he said.

Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), who also voted to impeach Trump, said he would leave it up to federal prosecutors to decide what to do. 

“I am not a lawyer and certainly not a prosecutor,” he said, adding he wasn’t surprised about the recommendation to prosecute.

“I don’t know the legal basis of it, but you know what I think of what the president did that day,” he said.  

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), who voted to convict Trump in his second impeachment trial, said she was not surprised by the criminal referral by the House committee.  

“Obviously they spent considerable time and [went into] great detail over many months they have investigated this,” she said. “It’s really up to [the Department of Justice] where they go next.” 

“I think it’s going to be important for us to read this report that will be coming out Wednesday,” she said.  

Asked about McConnell’s statement that the entire nation knows Trump is responsible for the Jan. 6 attack, Murkowski replied, “I agree. I voted to impeach him.”   

McConnell on Jan. 6 criminal referral of Trump: ‘Entire nation knows who is responsible for that day’

Posted on (Updated by Alexander Bolton

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on Monday issued a terse response to the House Jan. 6 select committee’s decision to refer criminal charges against former President Trump to the Justice Department.  

“The entire nation knows who is responsible for that day. Beyond that, I don’t have any immediate observations,” McConnell said in a statement reacting to the House panel voting to refer four criminal charges against Trump to prosecutors in connection to his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. 

The committee, made up of seven Democrats and two Republicans, recommended the Justice Department investigate Trump for inciting insurrection, obstructing an official proceeding, conspiring to defraud the United States and conspiring to make a false statement.  

The panel also recommended a formal ethics investigation of the role that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and several allies — Reps. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), Scott Perry (R-Pa.) and Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) — played on Jan. 6 and in the days before.

McConnell's statement responding to the action on the other side of the Capitol was bolder than those from some members of his leadership team.

Retiring Senate Republican Policy Committee Chairman Roy Blunt (Mo.) said he “had no idea” of the details of the referral.  

Incoming Senate Republican Conference Vice Chairwoman Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) said, “I never heard of Congress instructing [the Justice Department] in that way."

She said the committee’s work was “obviously politicized.”  

McConnell denounced Trump on the Senate floor in February 2021 after the former president was acquitted on the impeachment charge of inciting an insurrection.  

“There is no question that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of that day,” McConnell said, after voting to acquit the president on the technical grounds that he no longer held the office.  

Since then, McConnell has regularly declined to comment when asked what responsibility Trump bore for spreading the unsubstantiated belief that the 2020 presidential election was stolen.  

McConnell steps up attacks on a weakened Trump

Posted on (Updated by Alexander Bolton

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) is stepping up his attacks on former President Trump as Trump’s support dips.

The Senate GOP leader on Tuesday blamed Trump for the “candidate quality” problem that hampered the party’s bid to recapture the Senate in 2022, marking the third time in three weeks that McConnell has directly criticized the former president after repeatedly avoiding engaging with him over the past two years. 

The stronger pushback comes as polls show Trump’s support is slipping among Republican voters, a trend that has accelerated since Trump-aligned candidates lost important races across the country in the midterm elections. 

A USA Today-Suffolk University poll published Tuesday showed that 61 percent of Republican and Republican-leaning voters want someone else to be the party’s nominee for president in 2024. 

The poll also showed Republican voters prefer Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) over Trump as a potential presidential candidate by a margin of 56 percent to 33 percent. 

With Trump “leaking oil,” in the words of one GOP senator, McConnell isn’t wasting any time in striking back against someone who has repeatedly called for his ouster as Senate Republican leader. 

McConnell told reporters Tuesday that Trump was a big reason why Senate GOP leaders were not able to steer Senate nominations to stronger candidates in key battleground states such as Arizona, Georgia and New Hampshire. 

He had hinted at a press conference a week after Election Day that he thought Trump was a drag on Republican efforts to win back the Senate, but he made his criticism more explicit after Republicans lost another key race, last week’s Senate runoff in Georgia. 

“We ended up having a candidate quality [issue],” he told reporters Tuesday. “Look at Arizona, look at New Hampshire and the challenging situation in Georgia as well.” 

U.S. Rep. Mo Brooks was one of the candidates McConnell actively worked to get out of office while Trump pushed for his reelection.

McConnell said his affiliated super PAC, the Senate Leadership Fund, intervened in the Republican Senate primaries in Alabama and Missouri by investing money to defeat Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.) and former Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens.

But he argued that Trump’s influence with primary voters made it very difficult to weed out weak candidates who had Trump’s support or embraced his false claims of a stolen 2020 election. 

“Our ability to control the primary outcome was quite limited in ’22 because the support of the former president proved to be very decisive in these primaries. So my view was do the best you can with the cards you’re dealt. Hopefully in the next cycle we’ll have quality candidates everywhere and a better outcome,” he said. 

McConnell also took shots at Trump the previous two weeks when he criticized Trump’s call to terminate parts of the Constitution to allow himself to return to the White House and condemned Trump’s dinner at Mar-a-Lago with an outspoken white supremacist and antisemite. 

The leader’s stiffening rhetoric against the former president reflects the growing consensus within the Senate GOP conference that Trump would not match up well against President Biden or another Democrat in the 2024 general election and, if nominated for the White House, could drag down candidates in Senate races as well. 

So far, Sen. Tommy Tuberville (Ala.) is the only Republican senator to have publicly endorsed Trump’s 2024 presidential candidacy, which Trump launched with a rally at Mar-a-Lago on Nov. 15. 

Numerous Republicans went after Trump after he had dinner with Ye and Nick Fuentes, a white nationalist. Trump said he had no clue who Fuentes was after the dinner was revealed to the public.

McConnell questioned Trump’s ability to win the presidency after he had dinner with Ye, the artist formerly known as Kanye West, who has lost business partnerships after making a string of antisemitic comments, and Nick Fuentes, a prominent white supremacist and antisemite. 

“There is no room in the Republican Party for antisemitism or white supremacy, and anyone meeting with people advocating that point of view, in my judgment, [is] highly unlikely to ever be elected president of the United States,” he told reporters after Thanksgiving. 

The following week, McConnell observed that Trump or anyone else would have a hard time getting sworn into office if he refused to uphold the Constitution, a pointed reference to Trump’s call for a “termination” of “all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution” after new details emerged of content moderation at Twitter during the 2020 presidential election. 

At the same time, Trump’s legal problems are mounting, and GOP lawmakers think there’s a good chance that special counsel Jack Smith will move forward with one or multiple indictments against him. 

The Justice Department asked a federal judge to hold Trump in contempt of court for failing to comply with a subpoena to turn over classified documents he took from the White House. 

Trump’s family business, the Trump Organization, was convicted last week on 17 criminal counts related to what prosecutors said was a 15-year tax fraud scheme. 

McConnell’s stiffer stance against Trump also came after the former president encouraged National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman Rick Scott (R-Fla.) to challenge the senior Kentucky lawmaker for Senate GOP leader. 

Trump predicted Scott would “have a lot of support” if he challenged his leader, but McConnell defeated him easily in a 37-10 vote. 

McConnell and Trump haven’t spoken since Dec. 15, 2020, after McConnell recognized Biden as the winner of the presidential election. 

Their relationship really soured after McConnell excoriated Trump on the Senate floor for instigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, even though McConnell voted to acquit the president of the impeachment charge of inciting an insurrection. 

But after that scathing floor speech, McConnell kept largely quiet about Trump’s behavior and controversial comments throughout 2021 and 2022, when Trump repeatedly rehashed his false claims that the presidential election was stolen through widespread fraud. 

The family of the late Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick, who died in the line of duty defending lawmakers on Jan. 6, refused to shake McConnell’s hand — and that of House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy (Calif.) — at a Congressional Gold Medal ceremony last week because they felt GOP leaders didn’t do enough to call out Trump.