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Amid a fierce war of words between the GOP’s most powerful leader in Congress and the party’s most popular and influential Republican politician, the chair of the GOP Senate reelection arm wants unity as Republicans aim to win back the majority of the chamber. year.
Sen. Rick Scott of Florida, chairman of the National Republican Senate Committee (NRSC), remains silent amid the row between former President Trump and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.
Most Republicans want to see Trump play a big part in GOP moving forward
“President Scott’s goal is to win the Senate back, and the only way to do that is to work together,” a source with knowledge of the senator’s mind told Fox News. “And that includes both leader McConnell and Trump. That’s where Scott focuses.”
McConnell voted on Saturday to acquit the former president – who was impeached last month for inciting a Jan.6 insurgency on the U.S. Capitol by right-wing extremists and other Trump supporters aimed at disrupting certification by the President Joe Biden’s Electoral College Victory Congress.
But McConnell gutted Trump in a speech to the Senate minutes after the trial ended. And he did it again on Monday, writing in an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal: “There is no doubt that former President Trump bears moral responsibility. His supporters stormed the Capitol because of the disorderly lies he shouted into the world’s largest megaphone. His behavior during and after the chaos was also unacceptable. “
TRUMP TRASHES MCCONNELL IN SPARKLING STATEMENT
Trump hit back with a scathing statement on Tuesday, calling McConnell an “austere, sullen, and smileless political hack” and saying the GOP “would never be respected or strong again” with McConnell at its helm.
Trump promises to remain the dominant figure of the GOP going forward and pledges to support the main challengers against Republicans who crossed paths with him and are vying for re-election in 2022.
The row also comes as Trump flirts with a presidential election in 2024 in an attempt to return to the White House, and as the latest public opinion polls indicate, the former president remains extremely popular with Republican voters.
Trump’s oldest son, Donald Trump Jr., pointed out on Fox News’ “Hannity” Monday that his father “is going to keep pushing the America First program … He’s going to push for candidates who will, not for random establishment guys. “
And longtime Trump political adviser Corey Lewandowski recently told Fox News that the former president would be “actively involved” in key challenges facing Republicans who oppose him.
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But McConnell, in two interviews after the post-arraignment trial, said he could run into Trump in the upcoming GOP Senate primaries.
“My goal is, in every way possible, to have candidates representing the Republican Party who can win in November,” McConnell told Politico on Saturday. “Some of them may be people the former president likes. Others may not. The only thing that matters to me is eligibility.”
The key to winning in 2022 is “getting candidates who can actually win,” McConnell told The Wall Street Journal in another article this week. “It may or may not involve trying to influence the outcome of the primaries.”
McConnell’s comments fuel speculation that primary Senate showdowns over the next year and a half could turn into a power struggle between the Trump and anti-Trump factions of the GOP – and it is sure to bring life back uncomfortable for Republicans in the Senate in 2022.
Two longtime GOP senators due for re-election next year are already in Trump’s sights. They are Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, who voted to condemn Trump, and Republican number two in the house, Senator John Thune of South Dakota, who has criticized Trump’s failed attempts to attempt to overthrow Biden’s victory.
Scott pointed out in an interview with Fox News last month that the NRSC “is clearly going to support our incumbents.”
And the source stressed that Scott remains committed to supporting the GOP incumbents running for re-election, adding that “nothing that happened last week has changed his perspective.”
NRSC PRESIDENT PLANS DEMOCRATS ‘OVERREACH’ TO HELP GOP RESUME SENATE IN 2022
Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, who is due for re-election in 2022, advised to avoid infighting on Wednesday in the Fox News newsroom. “If we get into quarrels and personality brawls, we will be in dire straits in 2022 and 2024 – which means America will embrace socialism because we cannot act together on the right,” a- he declared. But he added that Trump was “the most powerful political figure on either side.”
Veteran Republican strategist Brian Walsh told Fox News “it’s far too early to tell” whether the Trump-McConnell clash will have a lasting impact on the GOP’s efforts to regain control of the Senate the party just lost. during the 2020 electoral cycle.
“There is no one who works harder and is more focused on winning back a Republican majority than Mitch McConnell,” noted Walsh, a former Senate GOP executive assistant who also served as the NRSC’s director of communications.
“No one should forget that he already helped win a majority in the Senate in 2014 without Donald Trump,” he said. Much of the ball is in the former president’s court, whether he wants to help Republicans win in 2022 or instead focus on the types of personal grievances that cost Republicans both Georgia Senate seats and the majority in January. “
Senate Democrats, who hope to defend and even expand their razor thin majority – the Senate is split 50/50 between the two parties but Democrats control the chamber due to the decisive vote of Vice President Kamala Harris in her President of the Senate role – appear to be profiting from the Trump-McConnell clash.
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Rick Scott and other Republicans desperately want to hide their position because they know the party is bitterly divided between McConnell’s toxic Washington policies and Trump’s messy conspiracy theories, but they can’t play both ways tables, “accused the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee. spokesperson Stewart Boss.
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