{"id":33818,"date":"2024-10-23T22:12:00","date_gmt":"2024-10-24T03:12:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=33818"},"modified":"2024-10-31T21:26:42","modified_gmt":"2024-11-01T02:26:42","slug":"mcconnell-says-maga-movement-is-completely-wrong-and-reagan-wouldnt-recognize-trumps-gop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=33818","title":{"rendered":"McConnell says \u2018MAGA movement is completely wrong\u2019 and Reagan \u2018wouldn\u2019t recognize\u2019 Trump\u2019s GOP"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

 <\/strong>Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell delivered a scathing assessment of the modern Republican Party in an upcoming biography, saying the \u201cMAGA movement is completely wrong\u201d and that Ronald Reagan \u201cwouldn\u2019t recognize\u201d the party today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI think Trump was the biggest factor in changing the Republican Party from what Ronald Reagan viewed and he wouldn\u2019t recognize today,\u201d McConnell told the Associated Press\u2019 Michael Tackett for the upcoming biography \u201cThe Price of Power\u201d obtained by CNN ahead of its release.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

McConnell added that the former president has \u201cdone a lot of damage to our party\u2019s image and our ability to compete.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cTrump is appealing to people who haven\u2019t been as successful as other people and providing an excuse for that, that these more successful people have somehow been cheated, and you don\u2019t deserve to think of yourself as less successful because things haven\u2019t been fair,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some of McConnell\u2019s strongest comments were focused on Trump\u2019s behavior after he lost the election in 2020, calling him \u201cerratic.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cUnfortunately, about half the Republicans in the country believe whatever he says,\u201d McConnell said at the time, adding to an oral historian, <\/strong>\u201cI think I\u2019m pretty safe in saying it\u2019s not just the Democrats who are counting the days until he leaves on January 20, but the Republicans as well.\u201d McConnell gave Tackett access to his personal archive, including an oral history he has been recording since 1995, for the book.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Republican leader eventually voted to acquit Trump during the second impeachment trial<\/u><\/a>, focused on the former president\u2019s involvement in the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. However, Tackett reports that McConnell had leaned towards voting to convict at certain points.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m not at all conflicted about whether what the president did is an impeachable offense. I think it is. Urging an insurrection and people attacking the Capitol as a direct result \u2026 is about as close to an impeachable offense as you can imagine, with the possible exception of maybe being an agent for another country,\u201d said McConnell.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know whether you can make a conclusive argument that he\u2019s directly responsible for them storming the Capitol, but I think it\u2019s not in dispute that those folks would not have been here in the first place if he had not asked them to come and to disrupt the actual acceptance of the outcome of the election,\u201d the Senate GOP leader said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Kentucky Republican did not mince words, calling Trump a \u201csleazeball,\u201d a \u201cnarcissist\u201d and saying that the former president is \u201cstupid as well as being ill-tempered.\u201d He added that Trump is \u201cnot very smart, irascible, nasty, just about every quality you would not want somebody to have.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While he dismissed Trump\u2019s attacks against him, saying \u201cevery time he takes a shot at me, I think it\u2019s good for my reputation,\u201d he added that the former president\u2019s attacks on his wife, Elaine Chao, Trump\u2019s former Transportation Secretary, went too far.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2022, Trump referred<\/u><\/a> to Chao as McConnell\u2019s \u201cChina loving wife, Coco Chow\u201d in a post on Truth Social. Tackett reports that Chao was \u201cdeeply disturbed\u201d by the comments, and McConnell said that his wife is \u201cnot used to taking a punch.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tackett also reports that McConnell cried while addressing his staff in the hours after the attack on the Capitol. \u201cYou are my staff, and you are my responsibility,\u201d he told them. \u201cYou are my family, and I hate the fact that you had to go through this.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He called the rioters who entered the Senate chamber, \u201cnarcissistic, just like Donald Trump, sitting in the vice president\u2019s chair taking pictures of themselves,\u201d adding it was a \u201cshocking occurrence and further evidence of Donald Trump\u2019s complete unfitness for office.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a statement to CNN about his comments on the former president in the book, McConnell said, \u201cWhatever I may have said about President Trump pales in comparison to what JD Vance, Lindsey Graham, and others have said about him, but we are all on the same team now.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Senate <\/strong>GOP leader and the former president have long had a rocky relationship, which Tackett details in the book. However, McConnell has endorsed Trump<\/u><\/a>, and met with him back in June of this year during Trump\u2019s meeting with Senate Republicans off the Hill.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

McConnell did not restrict his comments in the biography to the former president. He also criticized Sen. Rick Scott, who led the Senate Republicans\u2019 campaign committee during the 2022 midterms and proposed a highly controversial policy plan that was criticized by both parties, before unsuccessfully challenging<\/u><\/a> McConnell for Senate GOP leader. Scott has announced he is running<\/u><\/a> for leader again this year, though this time he will not be challenging McConnell, who will be stepping down from his leadership post.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think Rick makes a very good victim,\u201d quipped McConnell. \u201cI think he did a poor job of running the (Senate campaign) committee. His plan was used by the Democrats against our candidates as late as the last weekend (before the election). He promoted the fiction that we were in the middle of a big sweep when there was no tangible evidence of it. And I think his campaign against me was some kind of ill-fated effort to turn the attention away from him and on to somebody else.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

McConnell will remain in his role as Senate GOP leader through the end of the year until the start of the new Congress in early January.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Kentucky Republican, who has previously said he is most proud of his legacy in shaping the Supreme Court and leading the efforts to confirm three new conservative justices during Trump\u2019s presidency, acknowledged that Justice Clarence Thomas \u201cexercised pretty questionable judgment,\u201d when he chose to accept trips<\/u><\/a> from a major GOP donor. \u201cBut then again, I\u2019m not sure what the rules are,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In April 2023, when asked about reports on the trips, McConnell accused Democratic senators of launching political attacks on Thomas. \u201cThe Supreme Court and the court system is a whole separate part of our Constitution,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd the Democrats, it seems to me, spend a lot of time criticizing individual members of the court and going after the court as an institution.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

McConnell has previously praised Thomas\u2019 judgment and his work on the Court. \u201cI have total confidence in Justice Thomas\u2019s impartiality in every aspect of the work of the Court,\u201d he said on the Senate floor in 2022, before the reports of Thomas\u2019s travel came to light.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

McConnell also expressed support for special counsel Jack Smith\u2019s investigation into Trump\u2019s actions around the 2020 election and the insurrection. \u201cI think it was the single most \u2013 in a category by itself \u2013 of how wrong all of it was and there\u2019s no doubt who inspired it, and I just hope that he\u2019ll have to pay a price for it,\u201d said McConnell. \u201cIf he hasn\u2019t committed indictable offenses, I don\u2019t know what one is.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

cnn<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

 Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell delivered a scathing assessment of the modern Republican Party in an upcoming biography, saying the \u201cMAGA movement is completely wrong\u201d and that Ronald Reagan \u201cwouldn\u2019t recognize\u201d the party today. \u201cI think Trump was the biggest factor in changing the Republican Party from what Ronald Reagan viewed and he wouldn\u2019t recognize […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":33819,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[28036,30932,21064,1230],"class_list":["post-33818","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","tag-mcconnell","tag-reagan","tag-republican","tag-trump"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33818","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=33818"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33818\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33820,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33818\/revisions\/33820"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/33819"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=33818"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=33818"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=33818"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}