Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell will vote to acquit Donald Trump in the former president’s impeachment.
That’s according to a source familiar with McConnell’s thinking who was not authorized to publicly discuss the decision and spoke on condition of anonymity.
News of McConnell’s decision came Saturday ahead of what is expected to be the final day of the historic trial on the charge that Trump incited an insurrection in the deadly January 6 riot on Capitol Hill.
Many expect the top Senate Republican to back Trump’s acquittal of a charge of inciting the rioters who stormed the Capitol last month, but no one is really sure how McConnell will vote. The political universe in Washington and the world beyond will hold their collective breath when the Senate impeachment roll call comes to the Kentuckian name.
For more than 36 years in the Senate, the measured McConnell has earned a reputation for being deadpan in the service of caution. This time, the suspense about how he will vote underscores how much is at stake for McConnell and his party, although it seems extremely unlikely that 17 Republican senators will join the 50 Democrats in condemning Trump.
“The overwhelming number of Republican voters don’t want Trump to be condemned, so that means any political leader must act carefully,” said John Feehery, a former Republican Party aide in Congress. While Feehery noted that McConnell was clearly outraged by the attack, he said the senator is “trying to hold his party together.”
McConnell is the most influential Republican in the House and the oldest Republican leader in history, and a vote to acquit him would leave the party locked in its struggle to define itself in the post-Trump presidency. A guilty vote could do more to stir the waters of the Republican Party by signaling an attempt to alienate the party from a figure that still reveres the majority of its voters.
Either way, McConnell’s decision could sway the party’s short- and long-term electoral prospects and affect the political influence and legacy of both Trump and the Senate minority leader.
Just minutes after the Democratic-led House indicted Trump on January 13 for inciting insurrection, McConnell wrote to his Republican colleagues that he had “not made a final decision” on how he would vote in the Senate trial.
It was a telling departure from his swift opposition when the House indicted Trump in December 2019 for trying to force Ukraine to send the then-president’s political dirt on campaign rival Joe Biden and other Democrats.
McConnell also told associates that he thought Trump had committed actionable crimes and saw the moment as an opportunity to distance the Republican Party from the harm that the tumultuous Trump could inflict on it, a Republican strategist told The Associated Press at the time, speaking on condition. anonymity to describe private conversations.
However, when the trial began Tuesday, McConnell was among 44 Republican senators who voted against proceeding on the grounds that Trump was no longer president.
Only six Republicans voted for a trial, suggesting little chance that 17 of them will join Democrats in supporting the conviction.
By all accounts, McConnell has not pressured senators to contest, but has told them to vote on their conscience. His public words and demeanor have been equally unrevealing.
“We are all going to listen to what the lawyers have to say and present the arguments and work to resolve it,” he said two weeks ago.
McConnell spent the first week of the trial in his seat in the Senate chamber, staring straight ahead. An account by a reporter watching from the press gallery on Friday read: “McConnell was as stoic as ever, looking like a wax statue of himself at Madame Tussauds with his hands clasped in his lap.”
A McConnell vote to convict could provide cover for Republicans hesitant to join him. Even if Trump is acquitted, a substantial number of Republicans who voted guilty would cement the story that there was bipartisan support for repudiating Trump for the riots.
That could spoil Trump’s political appeal should he run again and further mitigate the impact his endorsement of other Republican candidates could have on moderate voters, whom he has already largely alienated.
However, a McConnell vote against the former president would also enrage many of the 74 million voters who supported Trump in November, a record for a Republican presidential candidate.
That could expose Republican senators seeking re-election in 2022 to the primaries of conservatives seeking revenge, which could give the Republican Party less attractive general election candidates as they try to win control of the Senate.
It would certainly also color the legacy of McConnell, a Republican Party supporter who turns 79 next Saturday and does not face reelection for nearly six years. Even critics say McConnell likes to play long-term.
“For McConnell, it’s always strategy, it’s always about how he can live to fight another day,” said Colmon Elridge, chairman of the Kentucky Democratic Party.
McConnell maneuvered during Trump’s four years in office as a captain directing a ship through a rocky strait in stormy seas. Battered at times by vengeful presidential tweets, McConnell had a habit of saying nothing about many of Trump’s outrageous comments.
He ended up guiding the Senate to victories like the 2017 tax cuts and confirmations from three Supreme Court justices and more than 200 other federal justices.
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She is a freelance blogger, writer, and speaker, and writes for various entertainment magazines.