This is an election year. Of course.

It is an election year in which the Senate currently stands at 50-50. The race to the Senate majority in 2022 is complicated and highly dependent upon two variables. The most important variable is Joe Biden’s perceived job performance, which – as of right now, is in the red. The second variable, one that is driving this current topic, is the type of Republican that wins the nomination for the election.

Donald Trump has had a tendency to support radicals who profess undying loyalty to Trump, often the type that is not in the GOP’s best interest. Nothing Trump does infuriates McConnell more. McConnell wants to be majority leader far more than he wants Trump to be president in 2024. McConnell has proven that he’s willing to break enough norms that he becomes almost a co-president when majority leader.

Thus it is that the relationship between McConnell and Trump has not only soured but become downright heated of late, with McConnell supporting the Select Committee. Additionally, a McConnell staff member, Scott Jennings, told Politico (Speaking of January 6th):

“If he follows the script laid out in his announcement of the news conference, he will commit a whitewashing of the day, repeating the lie that the 2020 election was rigged and defending his part in fomenting the insurrection — all while a solemn prayer service is held at the Capitol, in a vivid split-screen moment,” Politico reports. “And, as Trump castigates Republicans not toeing his line, his event will also serve as a marker of Trump’s extraordinary dominion over the GOP.

There is no conceivable way that an advisor to McConnell is making a comment like that to Politico without either McConnell’s instructions or McConnell’s blessing. Jennings went so far as to say that Trump is not the leader of the Republican party:

“He is not the leader of any Republican Party I recognize.”

Politico’s David Siders summed the situation up this way:

“One year ago, many prominent Republicans predicted Trump’s behavior on and ahead of Jan. 6 would relegate him to the fringes of the right, shaming the GOP back into the mainstream. Instead, the opposite has happened. When Trump speaks, he will set the table for a midterm election year with him firmly at the Republican Party’s center.”

McConnell was most certainly one of those Republicans (one who might be regretting his ‘not guilty’ vote right now) who thought Trump would be on the fringes. Instead, Trump is front and center in McConnell’s quest to retake the Senate, something that the GOP is slightly favored to do if it nominates real people, not Trump disciples.

Republicans need wins in states like Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, along with Nevada, Arizona, and Georgia. McConnell knows he can get those wins, but only with the right candidate. Trump is going to endorse the most loyal. Period.

It must absolutely infuriate McConnell to have Trump – still – control so much of the Republican machinery. That fury is starting to leak, which never ends well with Trump.

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[email protected] and Substack: Predictions for 2022

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