Mitch McConnell is Donald Trump’s most important man in Washington

Joe Biden’s Worst Nightmare: This is Trump’s “Grim Reaper” McConnell

The party’s chief congressman maintains loyalty to the president and other senators. Behind this is the hope of keeping one’s place.

Lukas Weyell / watson.de

With this statement, Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell dropped a bomb on Tuesday. Because What at first glance seems obvious is extremely dangerous in the current situation. Mitch McConnell’s quote means Republicans will join Donald Trump’s policy of not recognizing the presidential winner, Joe Biden.

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McConnell didn’t talk about election fraud, as the president of the United States did. Nor did Donald Trump directly declare the winner of the election. But McConnell refused to accept the democratic tradition in the United States of recognizing and congratulating the declared election winner. He apparently managed to swear to the party on the Trump line.

The overwhelming majority of Republicans in the Senate follow their majority leader. Only Senators Mitt Romney and Susan Collins dared to congratulate President-elect Joe Biden. Aside from these two exceptions, only Republican politicians who have nothing left to lose venture for cover: Jeb Bush, for example, the former governor of Florida and brother of former President George W. Bush.

If you follow historian Annika Brockschmidt, Mitch McConnell is one of the crucial pillars on which support for Trump’s autocratic politics of contempt rests:

Who is Mitch McConnell?

Mitch McConnell himself hails from the US state of Kentucky, which is a Republican stronghold. He has represented the state in the Senate since 1985. Since 2007 McConnell has been president of the Republican parliamentary group, which has held a majority in the Senate since 2015. This could make him the staunchest opponent of upcoming US President Joe Biden. In the past, McConnell was known for blocking bipartisan bills in the Senate, earning him the nickname “Grim Reaper”.

McConnell, a lawyer and attorney, served as a Justice Department employee under Republican President Gerald Ford prior to his political career. He tried several times to enter political office, which he failed until 1977. Eventually he managed to be elected Chief Executive / Judge of Jefferson County, the then political leadership in Jefferson County, Kentucky, with several hundred thousand inhabitants.

McConnell says he has worked hard for this career. As a result, he grew up under modest circumstances in the southern states of Alabama, Georgia and Kentucky. His father served in the United States Army, which is why the family had to relocate several times. When McConnell contracted polio at a young age, his family could barely pay the high costs of treatment and did not fail. McConnell’s career since then can be seen as an example of the “American dream”. Today he is one of the most powerful politicians in the United States.

Mitch McConnell war mal moderat

What today seems difficult to imagine for many who are confronted with the leader of the hard majority: the “Grim Reaper” was a tender. After his election to the Senate in 1985, McConnell was initially known to be a moderate reformer within Republican senators.

McConnell supported abortion rights and the rights of workers and trade unions. Over the past 35 years, however, it has moved further and further to the right. His biographer Alec MacGillis describes him as a “cynic”. McConnell is now seen as “the embodiment of conservative orthodoxy and the party tactical blockade on Capitol Hill.”

McConnell’s transformation is emblematic of the Republican party establishment: Just like him, over the past 35 years his party has grown from a state-sponsored conservative party pursuing a value-oriented policy to a reservoir of populists and opportunists like Newt Gingrich, spokesman for Republicans in the House of Representatives from 1995 to 1999, or Donald Trump developed.

McConnell accompanied and supported this development in the Senate. With the rise of the right-wing populist Tea Party movement within the Republican Party McConnell opened up more and more to populist tendencies in the late 2000s. Republicans have vowed above all to mobilize their electorate.

In return, McConnell throws his convictions overboard: When constitutional judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg died in September this year just before the US presidential election, McConnell came out in favor of replacing Judge Amy Coney Barett, the judge, who is considered far-right was named by Trump within weeks and confirmed by the Senate.

Towards the end of Barack Obama’s term, McConnell said a president would not be allowed to propose new judges to the Supreme Court at the end of his term because voters would have to decide. The occasion was then: after the death of conservative judge Antonin Scalia, Obama had proposed moderate Merrick Garland as his successor. With a majority in the Senate, Republicans ensured that Garland was not even allowed to be heard and Obama’s nomination failed.

McConnell’s wife is a member of Trump’s cabinet

The Senate Majority Leader also has one foot in the White House in private: McConnell is the second wife of Republican Elaine Chao. Chao was Secretary of Labor under George W. Bush for eight years and is the first Sino-American politician to hold the rank of cabinet in US history. He currently heads the Department of Transportation in Donald Trump’s cabinet.

Chao comes from a wealthy Chinese family, which probably brings some advantages to her and McConnell. She and her husband reportedly received at least $ 25 million in campaign aid from the Chaos family. And it is said that Republicans’ finances are not bad in other ways either: among other things, Chao has shares in a road construction company that he has not sold even after being appointed Minister of Transportation. This earned her strong criticism due to the associated conflict of interest.

Mitch McConnell is therefore considered extremely well connected to the White House, although he is said to have a strained relationship with President Trump every now and then.

What’s behind McConnell’s support for Trump’s tactics?

Aside from tactical opportunism and the fact that most of the Republican Party is dedicated to its president, Trump’s tactic of contesting the election also brings personal advantage to Mitch McConnell. There will be more elections in two months, this time in Georgia. There it will be decided whether the Republicans will be able to keep the majority in the Senate.

Mitch McConnell’s tactic of keeping the White House tied for as long as possible could also be related to trying to turn the Georgia election in a positive direction. Because without the support of the incumbent US president, it will be difficult to mobilize the electorate.

So if Georgia falls into the hands of the Democrats, it could be the end of the “Grim Reaper” as majority leader in the Senate. Then McConnell would only be a minority leader, unless his Republican party colleagues drop him altogether.