Is Mitch McConnell finally a free agent?
With the leadership elections behind them, Republican senators are musing about what McConnell’s forthcoming return to the rank-and-file means for the Senate.
There’s no doubt that some Senate Republicans, especially the national security hawks, will be looking to McConnell as a bellwether on important votes, including on some of President-elect Donald Trump’s more controversial nominees.
“I don’t know that [McConnell] wants to play that role. But if he does, he could do it better than anybody. He knows both our process and he knows the politics of it very, very well,” Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) said. “Just by virtue of his influence, which is earned by experience, not by title, he will always have a bit of a sage role.”
But it’s unclear how, and whether, McConnell will utilize his post-leadership clout and how much of a difference it could make, especially given Republicans’ overwhelming deference to Trump thus far.
McConnell has said he plans to continue speaking out against his party’s isolationist drift on foreign policy. But GOP senators we spoke with noted McConnell has a unique opportunity to shape policy and personnel during the next Trump administration — without the pressures of being in leadership.
“He and I both agree we’ve been liberated,” joked Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), who lost the leadership race earlier this week to Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.). “But I know how strongly [McConnell] feels about foreign policy and national security matters. I agree with him on that.”
McConnell will have a chance to make an impact almost immediately in the new Congress with Trump’s nomination of former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) as director of national intelligence, as well as former Rep. Matt Gaetz’s (R-Fla.) nomination for attorney general.
Gabbard’s foreign policy views are anathema to McConnell, a longtime defense hawk who favors boosting Pentagon spending and has been Washington’s most vocal supporter of Ukraine. Gabbard opposes U.S. assistance for Ukraine, often to the point of amplifying Russian propaganda.
Will he, won’t he: It’s one thing to speak out. Voting that way is an entirely different calculation.
There’s a belief that if McConnell opposes Gabbard’s nomination, it could provide cover to other Senate Republicans who align with his foreign policy views. With a 53-47 margin, Trump can only afford to lose three Republican votes, assuming there’s full attendance.
“I’m sure he won’t try to second-guess the new leader or undermine Sen. Thune in any way,” longtime McConnell ally Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) said, referring to incoming Senate Majority Leader John Thune. “But it’s just natural that he will have well-developed ideas and strategies on a host of issues and that members want to hear that.”
The flip side of this is that McConnell could actually be helping Thune. By taking arrows for tanking a nomination or other measure, McConnell would take the pressure off Thune and the rest of the GOP leadership, insulating them from Trump’s wrath.
Across the Capitol, former Speaker Nancy Pelosi – in many ways McConnell’s peer – has played a major role for House Democrats despite her backbencher status, especially in the push to get President Joe Biden off the Democratic ticket. That kind of drama isn’t going to happen to the 82-year-old McConnell, yet it shows how he can have influence even if no longer serving as party leader.
McConnell isn’t telegraphing his strategy quite yet. But he had this to say at an AEI event this week: “Each of these nominees needs to come before the Senate and go through the process and be vetted.”
The ‘team player’: Not everyone thinks McConnell will go full YOLO. Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), who’s close with McConnell, said the Kentucky Republican is a “team player who’s going to continue to do the same thing regardless of how he feels personally.”
“I just don’t see it,” Tillis said of McConnell breaking with the rest of the conference. “Some people are going to think it’s a payback session or something like that. That’s absurd.”
Yet Anti-McConnell conservatives are giddy that he’ll no longer be in charge. But they think McConnell’s style could inject a lot of uncertainty.
“Everybody realizes that was a one-man dictatorship, didn’t involve people, it was his strategy, which he would never reveal till the last minute,” Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) warned.
