TEMPE, Ariz. — Arizona Republican Senate candidate Kelli Ward is “open” to backing Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., as the GOP leader in 2019 if she is elected.
Ward, a conservative who has tried to ally herself closely with the president, told the Washington Examiner that she is not ruling out a vote for McConnell, with whom she has clashed throughout the past three years while running for the Senate. She left the door open because she is not sure who will be up for the post next year.
“I don’t know yet. I’ve got to see who’s up. I’ve got to see what he does in there the rest of the time,” Ward said, adding, “I’m open to supporting anybody and working with anybody,” when pressed about voting for the GOP leader if she wins both the primary on Aug. 28 and the November general election. “I’m looking on working on some issues across the aisle and bringing the whole Arizona delegation together, which we haven’t done very often,” she said.
“I don’t know that I’m a fan or not a fan because I’ve never even had a chance to have a conversation with him,” Ward said of McConnell, adding that it’s all dependent on his support for the Trump agenda. “If he doesn’t do his job, he doesn’t deserve to be in that position … The job I think Sen. McConnell should be doing is to help President Trump advance the America First agenda that the people sent him to Washington to achieve.”
The two-time Senate candidate has been at times outspoken against the Kentucky Republican and has argued he isn’t pushing hard enough for President Trump’s policies. She told Fox Business earlier this week that McConnell should resign as leader if he does not pass a bill through the Senate that includes funding for a border wall in the upcoming must-past spending bill. She has called on McConnell to eliminate the legislative filibuster in order to do so, echoing the president’s desire for the change
Ward has also had a rocky relationship with McConnell’s allies, who have worked to ensure she does not become the Republican nominee in November. Last year, when she was running against Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., the Senate Leadership Fund, a McConnell-backed group, slammed her in an ad for “crazy ideas” and “embarrassing behavior.”
Ward is currently polling second in the Arizona GOP Senate primary behind Rep. Martha McSally, R-Ariz. According to the latest RealClearPolitics average, McSally leads Ward by eight points.
McConnell has been a polarizing figure in some GOP Senate campaigns since Trump’s election nearly two years ago, but high-profile figures haven’t always found success without McConnell’s support. These include Judge Roy Moore in Alabama, who lost to Sen. Doug Jones, D-Ala., last year, and Don Blankenship, who lost the West Virginia GOP primary to Patrick Morrisey in May after dubbing McConnell “Cocaine Mitch.”
