The conventional wisdom on Capitol Hill has long been that Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell would retire at the end of his current term, rather than run for re-election in Kentucky. It now appears those assumptions were true. NBC News reported:
Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., the longest-serving Senate leader in history, announced Thursday on his 83rd birthday that he won’t seek re-election next year, bringing an end to his four-decade career in the chamber. McConnell, first elected in 1984, climbed his way up to the Senate Republican leader position in 2007 and remained there until early 2025, serving during four administrations in the majority and the minority.
As McConnell prepares to walk away from an institution he’s served in for four decades, there will no doubt be ample discussion about the senator’s “legacy,” and as someone who’s watched his career closely, I’ll gladly confess that the former GOP leader has had a dramatic impact on the Senate and the nation.
I think it’s also fair to say, however, that his impact has not always been a positive one. I’m reminded of a column The Washington Post’s Dana Milbank wrote in 2017, describing McConnell as the politician who effectively “broke America.”
No man has done more in recent years to undermine the functioning of U.S. government. His has been the epitome of unprincipled leadership, the triumph of tactics in service of short-term power. … McConnell is no idiot. He is a clever man who does what works for him in the moment, consequences be damned.
The point isn’t that the Kentucky Republican has lacked triumphs. Rather, the point is to question whether those victories had value to the American political system.
It was McConnell, for example, who helped change Senate norms to require 60-vote supermajorities on practically every piece of legislation of any significance. It was McConnell who helped take the lead in creating the modern judicial confirmation wars. It was McConnell who derailed every recent attempt at campaign-finance reforms.
It was McConnell who led an effort to effectively steal a Supreme Court seat. It was McConnell who let Donald Trump off the hook after Jan. 6. It was McConnell who cooked up an unprecedented scorched-earth scheme to undermine Barack Obama’s presidency, deliberately refusing to consider any compromises — even if it meant rejecting his own ideas — as part of a failed effort to ensure that the Democratic president only served one term.
All of which is to say, as regular readers know, McConnell’s “victories” are a matter of perspective.
As for the near future, there will now be an open-seat Senate contest in the Bluegrass State next year. On the surface, Kentucky is a reliably red state, and GOP officials are very likely confident that McConnell will pass the torch to a member of his own party. That said, Democratic officials will almost certainly encourage incumbent Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear — a well-liked two-term Democrat — to run for the seat.
As for the likely GOP field, no Republicans officially launched campaigns ahead of McConnell’s expected retirement announcement, but Rep. Andy Barr has already told party officials that he intends to run for the seat.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
