WASHINGTON—Having retired as leader of the Republican Conference in 2024 after 18 years in the role, Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has emerged as Trump’s biggest Republican detractor in the Senate.
On key votes to grant advice and consent to Trump’s cabinet nominees, as the Constitution requires of the Senate, McConnell has been a consistent Republican vote against several of them. Most recently, he voted against the nominations of Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, and Secretary of Defense Peter Hegseth. In the latter case, Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) joined in opposition, prompting Vice President JD Vance to cast a tie-breaking vote in favor.
“I’m a survivor of childhood polio,” McConnell wrote in a statement on Feb. 13 after he voted against Kennedy’s nomination, citing Kennedy’s previous advocacy on vaccines. “In my lifetime, I’ve watched vaccines save millions of lives from devastating diseases across America and around the world. I will not condone the re-litigation of proven cures, and neither will millions of Americans who credit their survival and quality of life to scientific miracles.
“Mr. Kennedy failed to prove he is the best possible person to lead America’s largest health agency.”
Though McConnell has supported other cabinet nominees this term, Trump criticized his recent votes against Kennedy, Gabbard, and Hegseth.
“I feel very sorry for Mitch … he’s not equipped mentally,” Trump said on Feb. 13 after the vote on Kennedy’s nomination. “He let the Republican Party go to hell. … He raised a lot of money and gave it to senators, and so he had a little loyalty based on [that] fact.”
Trump also said that he forced McConnell to retire from the Senate Republican Conference’s leadership position, citing that as the reason for McConnell’s opposition.
“He’s not voting against Bobby [Kennedy], he’s voting against me … he votes against almost everything now,” Trump said.
McConnell endorsed Trump in the 2016 presidential election, after which he worked with him to pass conservative legislation, chiefly the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, and to confirm conservative jurists to federal courts. Still, McConnell declined to align with Trump’s demands on one key issue—the Senate’s “cloture” requirement that 60 votes be needed to limit debate and pass a bill, overcoming a filibuster.
McConnell also endorsed Trump in the 2024 election. However, their relationship was negative following the 2020 presidential election, when Trump challenged President Joe Biden’s victory over him. McConnell consistently opposed Trump’s claims that the election was “rigged.”
“President Trump claims the election was stolen. The assertions range … to sweeping conspiracy theories,” McConnell said on the Senate floor on Jan. 6, 2021. “Nothing before us proves illegality anywhere near the massive scale … that would have tipped the entire election. Nor can public doubt alone justify a radical break, when the doubt itself was incited without any evidence.”
McConnell declined to cooperate with Trump’s request that Congress act to prevent the certification of Biden’s victory.
McConnell later said Trump was “morally responsible” for the events of that day, when protesters breached the U.S. Capitol and disrupted the certification of Biden’s victory. However, he later voted to acquit Trump in the ensuing impeachment trial against the outgoing president on the charge of inciting an insurrection on that day.
Trump, shortly afterward, issued a statement saying that “if Republican senators are going to stay with [McConnell], they will not win again.”
Following his retirement as leader on Jan. 3, McConnell has taken on a lower-profile role in the Senate. He became chairman of the Rules Committee, a role he’s held twice before, which deals with administrative and constitutional matters concerning the Senate. Most recently, he was spotted by The Epoch Times in a wheelchair after falling while walking around the Capitol building.
McConnell has experienced a series of public health episodes that have raised questions about his fitness to serve. In 2023, he froze twice during public press conferences while speaking, prompting him to be escorted away by colleagues and the U.S. Capitol Police. He has also fallen three times in public—twice in 2023 and a third time on Dec. 10, 2024, resulting in injuries.
McConnell’s seventh term will end on Jan. 3, 2027. It remains unclear whether he will run for reelection, though it is unlikely that he will get Trump’s endorsement.
“I know the politics within my party at this particular moment in time. I have many faults. Misunderstanding politics is not one of them,” McConnell said as he announced his retirement as leader in February 2024. “I still have enough gas in my tank to thoroughly disappoint my critics, and I intend to do so with all the enthusiasm to which they’ve become accustomed.”
A spokesperson for McConnell’s office referred The Epoch Times to the senator’s website in response to a request for comment.
McConnell obviously got onto bed with the Chinese when he got married to Elaine Chao who has big time Chinese family business Connections that are all doing very, very, well,,,,Thanks to Mitch. At this point due to age, he is just taking up a voting seat as a Trump spoiler with his strings being pulled by the Red Chinese. He is the Republican version of sleepy Joe Biden, whose brain got too soon old and too late stupid, and does only what his wife tells him to do. He, like Joe is another poster child as to why forced government retirement should occur at age 65, or even sooner when the senility takes over, and a younger man is needed to represent THE PEOPLE in the blood sport of real Conservative politics. You can thank Mitch for lots of that $36 Trillion in national debt whose corrupt programs he refused to stop, trading one favor for another, Choa’ing down on the fat of the American landscape. at the American Taxpayers expense. His time has come and thankfully will soon go as he, like McCarthur’s old soldier, might never die,,,but just fade away. Reveal Just what is HIS political crime family’s net worth is today, and how he acquired that wealth, and you will soon see he is just another more Conservative polite version of Joe Biden, controlled by their master called personal GREED.
I wish I could give more than one star of approval on this post. Having McConnell in the Senate is like having another democrat to deal with on every Trump initiative. I sure wouldn’t call him a true conservative just because he has an “R” by his name. I can’t figure out if he is corrupt or just brain dead, and I have no idea how he made it to the head of the GOP senate leadership. What a loser.
I Keep wondering. WHAT EXACTLY is in the water out there, in Kentucky, for this cretin to KEEP GETTING Re-elected to the senate!?!?!?
Why does it have to be a Chinese thing? Most Chinese are good, hard-working people. Worthy of our respect, not condemnation.
I dont know all of the Chinese People’s so I cant speak to what percentage are hard workers of their own volition vs. some government “incentive” keeping them hard at it.
I do know it doesn’t have to be a Chinese thing. It could be in this case its simply not an Islamic thing, an Arab thing, a Russian thing or a Ukrainian thing.
Republican, Mitch McConnel, Liz Cheny, Are -( RINO,) Republicans.- ” It’s Hard For A Leper To Change it’s Stripes.” Author Unknown.
Correction In Spelling, It should be-LEOPARD.
Lepers is an apt phrase as well..
The old POS needs to retire and go back to his rocking chair on his Kentucky front porch. I always thought Harry Reid was the worst slimy, nasty, pos in the Senate , but has climbed past Harry to the bottom of the ladder and below.
The American RINO should be voted to extinction.
At least we have McConnell to thank for keeping Garland off the Supreme Court
Mr. Tuttle Man is a resureccted RINO.
I thought he was going to retire – he should, and take Nancy Pelosi with him. He’s past his expiration date.
AND take a lot of others with him.