Senate Majority Leader Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has announced that he has canceled most of the Senate’s August recess to keep vulnerable red-state Democrats off of the campaign trail ahead of the midterm election.
Here is McConnell’s statement:
NBC’s Kasie Hunt discusses why McConnell canceled the August recess:
McConnell’s right-hand man in the Senate Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) quickly blew up McConnell’s excuse about Democratic obstruction:
John Cornyn was explicit that canceling recess will hurt Democrats in comments just now: “Now they’re desperate, because they realize they’re more exposed politically bc they’ve got so many people up running for re-election in red states.” https://t.co/2gKUI6sbVG
— Ryan Grim (@ryangrim) June 5, 2018
As PoliticusUSA first reported in April, McConnell has been kicking around a few different schemes to keep Democrats off the campaign trail.
A party that is in a position of strength does not need to keep their opponents off the campaign trail. Republicans have done virtually nothing besides harm people’s healthcare and cut taxes for the wealthy and corporations since they have taken full control of the federal government. They have few achievements to run on and going to have difficulty expanding their majority even with a 2018 map that is strongly tilted in their favor.
Mitch McConnell’s Senate Republicans can’t win the election straight up, so McConnell is trying to tip the playing field even more in their favor. Whether or not this strategy will work is questionable. If the blue wave comes, McConnell may end up hurting his own incumbents more than he imagines.
If the Majority Leader would put a fraction of the time that he spends on schemes into working in a bipartisan way and governing, Republicans might not have to worry so much about clinging on to their one-seat majority in the Senate.
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Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association
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