Top GOP Senators Moving To OUST McConnell; “Our Opportunity To Take Him Out”

Following the disastrous ‘border security bill’ that fell flat in Congress on Wednesday, several GOP senators are reportedly aiming to remove Minority Leader Mitch McConnell from leadership.

🚨 BREAKING: A group of high ranking GOP Senators are moving to OUST Senator Mitch McConnell from Senate Leadership.

WOULD YOU SUPPORT THIS? 🙋🏻‍♂️https://t.co/Jy6DfXx1YR

— Proud Elephant 🇺🇸🦅 (@ProudElephantUS) February 8, 2024

Speaking to the Daily Caller, Sen. Ted Cruz said, “Mitch McConnell, in effect, gave the largest in-kind campaign contribution to the Democrats’ Senate campaign committee in history.”

Another unnamed senator added, “I think this is our opportunity to take him out, and we’re sort of working to figure out if that’s possible.”

Here’s more from that exclusive report:

Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell’s days leading the Republican minority could be numbered following the collapse of Senate leadership’s bipartisan national security supplemental aid bill this week. Several prominent Republican senators expressed that the border bill debacle could push the GOP conference over the edge to remove McConnell from leadership, they told the Daily Caller in exclusive conversations Wednesday.

“Mitch McConnell, in effect, gave the largest in-kind campaign contribution to the Democrats’ Senate campaign committee in history,” Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz told the Caller.

Conservatives both inside the official Republican Party apparatus and out have long criticized McConnell, an institution in the Senate with a reputation for shrewd negotiation and savvy maneuvering, for not taking sufficiently hardline stances on key issues to the party’s base. McConnell has continued to keep a stranglehold on power in the Republican conference for nearly two decades, but momentum to remove him has reached a fevered pitch after a tidal wave of backlash to the border policy proposal unveiled this week.

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“I think this is our opportunity to take him out, and we’re sort of working to figure out if that’s possible. I think that there’s a bit of a chicken and egg problem where I think you probably have the votes, but you need somebody to step forward and that person’s that unwilling to step forward unless you have the votes, it can’t just be a Mike and Ted and a sort of everybody who hates Mitch thing,” one Republican senator, who was granted anonymity to speak freely without worry of retaliation from leadership, told the Caller. “You obviously have to get kind of the middle of the conference. So that’s all being worked on behind the scenes. And I think, frankly, how this vote works out will help determine whether the conference, broadly speaking, is willing to go in that direction.”

The Western Journal also commented on growing calls to remove McConnell from leadership:

Several Republican senators are reportedly looking into removing Mitch McConnell as GOP Senate leader on the tail of the disastrous border bill that he helped negotiate with the Democrat Party.

The 81-year-old senator from Kentucky, who was first elected to the upper chamber in 1985 and has been the leader of the Senate Republican Caucus since 2007, worked hard behind the scenes for the horrid amnesty-laden border bill that Republicans in the House of Representatives said is “dead on arrival.”

In fact, Democrat Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York was full of praise for McConnell for working so closely with him on the border bill that would allow millions more illegals to stream across the border and would act like an even louder siren call to lure them here.

The bill was so bad, though, that McConnell — who has long been an amnesty supporter — even turned against the bill himself, saying that there was “no real chance” that the bill could pass, and urged his caucus not to vote in favor of the first vote to proceed.

But the fact that he was instrumental in writing the bill in close cooperation with the Democrats is a black mark on his name, at least as far as other GOP senators, including Ted Cruz, J.D. Vance and Ron Johnson, are concerned. Consequently, some senators are openly talking about voting to oust McConnell as their GOP leader in the U.S. Senate.

However, Mitch McConnell doesn’t think he is going anywhere.

“They had their shot,” he responded in the face of GOP backlash…

Mitch McConnell scoffs at GOP critics after his border deal collapses: 'They had their shot' https://t.co/qJLlSJfDlT

— Fox News (@FoxNews) February 7, 2024

Per AP News:

After months of negotiations and delays, the Senate on Thursday voted to move forward on legislation that would provide wartime aid to Ukraine and Israel. While far from a final vote, it was a momentary victory for Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, a strong supporter of the aid for Ukraine, in particular, despite a growing number in his party who have opposed it.

But the deep Republican divide over the aid, along with contentious debate over a border policy compromise with Democrats that was blocked by GOP senators earlier this week, has recently left a small group of senators in his conference fuming — and some even calling for his removal.

“WE NEED NEW LEADERSHIP — NOW,” Utah Sen. Mike Lee posted on X after the text of the border bill was released on Sunday evening. He added in another post, “Senate GOP leadership screwed this up — and screwed us.”

While McConnell’s job isn’t immediately in danger, and the vast majority of the conference still supports him, the growing anger from a small section of his caucus has rattled GOP senators and upended their regular private meetings, which have devolved into occasional yelling and frustration. Shortly before the vote Thursday to move forward on Ukraine aid, Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley said McConnell isn’t listening to his members as a growing number of them have opposed the foreign assistance.

In an interview Thursday with The Associated Press, McConnell said he’s not going anywhere. “They’ve had their shot,” he said of his critics, referring to the 2022 leadership election, in which Florida Sen. Rick Scott challenged him and received 10 votes out of 49 Republicans. He would not say, though, whether he will run for leader again after the November election.

“I haven’t made any announcement on that yet,” McConnell said.

What do you think?

Do you agree that McConnell should be removed from GOP leadership?

Are his days numbered?