MADISONVILLE, Ky. — Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell on Sunday sketched out scenarios where a Republican majority might work with President Obama even as he signaled that a unified GOP Congress would push the administration to change course on key policies.
Speaking to reporters after riding with wife Elaine Chao in the Madisonville Veterans Day Parade, Kentucky’s largest such event, McConnell vowed to oppose Obama’s environmental policy as it relates to coal and speculated that a Republican Senate, with the chamber’s role in foreign policy, might force the president to alter his approach to international affairs.
But McConnell, who faces voters Tuesday in his bid for a sixth term, also noted that he has been willing to compromise with the Obama administration, citing the three major fiscal agreements he struck with Vice President Joe Biden. McConnell suggested that Senate Republicans and Obama might find common ground on tax reform and free trade agreements.
“I think the first thing that we ought to do, if the American people would give us an entirely Republican Congress, is see what we can agree on and try to make some progress,” McConnell said. “There will be plenty of things that we don’t agree on.”
After a bitter, hard-fought campaign, public opinion polls indicate that McConnell should cruise to victory over Kentucky Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes, a Democrat. Grimes also appeared in the Madisonville Veterans Day Parade Sunday in Western Kentucky, hand-in-hand with her husband about two cars back from the convertible in which McConnell and his wife rode.
McConnell said he’s “hopeful and optimistic” that he’ll win re-election — and that Republicans will flip the six Democratic-held seats they need to win the Senate majority. Beyond that, McConnell declined to comment on a spate of weekend polls that showed Republican candidates expanding their leads in battleground states and putting the GOP in a better position to win a majority of seats in the Senate on Election Day, or in possible runoffs to follow.
“I think we ought to wait to see what happens Tuesday night,” McConnell said.
