Rick Scott launches Senate leadership bid against Mitch McConnell

MITCH MCCONNELL UNDER INCREASED PRESSURE TO DELAY LEADERSHIP ELECTIONS AFTER MIDTERM DISAPPOINTMENT

Scott and McConnell feuded over midterm strategy throughout the election cycle. Scott chairs the National Republican Senatorial Committee, though McConnell also has sway over spending through his affiliated political action committee, the Senate Leadership Fund.

“I’m writing to you today because I believe it’s time for the Senate Republican Conference to be far more bold and resolute than we have been in the past,” Scott said in a letter to colleagues asking for support in his bid. “We must start saying what we are for, not just what we are against.”

“I’m not satisfied with the status quo. And so I think we ought to have an option,” Scott added in a gaggle with reporters.

After the nearly three-hour Senate GOP lunch, in which Scott and McConnell had a “candid” back-and-forth, McConnell and the rest of the leadership team emerged to address reporters. McConnell said he already has the votes locked up to win a Wednesday leadership election, which is set for 9:30 a.m. Wednesday morning.

“I think the outcome is very clear. I have the votes to get elected,” McConnell said Tuesday afternoon. “I don’t own this job. Anybody in the conference is certainly welcome to challenge me, and I welcome the competition,” he said.

There’s been a major rift between the Florida senator and McConnell, who voiced concerns about “candidate quality,” a reference to GOP nominees endorsed by former President Donald Trump, in Republicans’ pursuit to gain control of the Senate.

The Senate Leadership Fund, McConnell’s super PAC, pulled out of races in Arizona and New Hampshire after it lost confidence in GOP nominees there. In mid-September, McConnell downplayed expectations of a GOP majority next year.

On Tuesday, the minority leader reflected on the outcome and delivered his election post-mortem.

“We underperformed with independents and moderates because their impression of many of the people in our party and leadership roles is that they’re engulfed in chaos, negativity — excessive attacks that frightened independent and moderate voters. We had a national issue set that was favorable, but as a result of our own — the perception many of them had that we were not dealing with issues in a responsible way,” McConnell said.

During the midterm elections, Scott publicly stated that Republicans would win as many as 54 seats in the Senate, while McConnell was more cautious in his remarks.

“We all saw that, and as you can all recall, I did not predict a red wave. We never saw that in our polling,” McConnell added. “For example, we just got crushed in Arizona and New Hampshire. So, we learned some lessons. I think the lessons are pretty clear — Senate races are different. Candidate quality, as I said in August, is important. In most of our states, we met that test. In a few of them, we did not.”

Some Senate Republicans told the Washington Examiner that they doubt a challenge to McConnell will be successful.

“Well, I don’t know. I mean, I like Rick a lot. I think he’s a great senator,” Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-ND) said before the Senate lunch. “But if you’re going to assess blame for election losses, I don’t think you trade in the leader for the chairman of the NRSC. That’s just sort of basic to me. And I like him — he’s a good NRSC chairman — but I think it’s not likely.”

Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT) said, “Mitch McConnell will be the leader. I support him.” Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) added, “I don’t really see that. I do see us taking a deep breath.”

Other Republicans, including Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), have called for delaying the leadership elections that are supposed to take place Wednesday until after a Georgia Senate runoff is decided on Dec. 6. Though the upper chamber will remain in Democratic hands, the Georgia race will decide the size of the Democratic majority. It went to a runoff after neither Democratic incumbent Sen. Raphael Warnock nor Republican Herschel Walker secured more than 50% of the vote.

“I just think that with Georgia outstanding, I would like to finish 2022. In terms of leadership elections, it’s not about niches so much as we don’t even know who’s in the conference,” Graham said. “We have to figure out what went wrong and why the results were so disappointing.”

Graham went on to predict the elections would likely move forward as scheduled on Wednesday.

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He continued, “I think most people in the conference would prefer President Trump not to announce tonight, and I think most Republicans would prefer for us to not have these elections,” touching on Trump’s expected announcement for his 2024 presidential run later Tuesday night.

In the House GOP leadership elections Tuesday, current Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) won the nomination for speaker of the House, while Steve Scalise (R-LA) will be majority leader and National Republican Congressional Committee Chairman Tom Emmer (R-MN) will be whip.