'Wild card': Why 'Crafty' Mitch McConnell 'doesn’t mind sticking Trump in the eye'

In the past, Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) was a major source of frustration to Democrats. The former Senate majority leader, after the death of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia in 2016, blocked then-President Barack Obama's nominee Merrick Garland — only to ram through all three of President Donald Trump's nominees for the High Court: Brett Kavanaugh, Neil Gorsuch and Amy Coney Barrett.

Yet McConnell, who stepped down as GOP leader in the U.S. Senate in 2024, is neither a MAGA Republican nor a Never Trumper. Although there is a lot of bad blood between McConnell and Trump and the Kentucky Republican would have much preferred another GOP presidential nominee in 2024, McConnell gave Trump a lukewarm, unenthusiastic endorsement after former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley dropped out of the race.

In an article published on July 18, The Hill's Alexander Bolton stresses that McConnell "has emerged as one of the biggest wild cards in the Senate, keeping his Republican colleagues guessing about how he'll vote on elements of President Trump’s agenda."

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"McConnell has been largely sidelined from important leadership-level discussions since he stepped down as Senate Republican leader at the end of 2024 after a record-setting 18 years in the post, say Senate colleagues," Bolton reports. " But the crafty veteran senator has used high-profile dissenting votes and carefully timed statements to make his influence felt throughout the Senate GOP conference and to signal when he thinks Trump — and by extension, Trump’s allies in Congress — are moving in the wrong direction. In doing so, he's using his leverage to preserve the values of the traditional GOP establishment in Washington."

At times, Bolton notes, the 83-year-old McConnell has joined GOP Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins in voting "no" on bills that Trump favored.

A GOP senator, interviewed on condition of anonymity, told The Hill, "I think it's him being Mitch McConnell as the senior senator from Kentucky, as a leader in the Senate for decades who no longer has the burden of leadership and is just free to be a lawmaker. I think that's what you see in Mitch; I love it."

Tweeting his article on July 18, Bolton noted, "Republican colleagues are trying to decipher Mitch McConnell who has transitioned from longest-serving GOP leader to Senate wildcard. McConnell is throwing curveballs at his leadership and the Trump administration and some GOP senators 'love it.'"

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"Senate Budget Committee Chair Lindsey Graham (R-SC) said he thought McConnell's votes breaking with the GOP leadership were 'more directed at Trump,'" Bolton notes in his article. "A second Republican senator, who requested anonymity to speak on the subject, said McConnell doesn't mind sticking Trump in the eye given their rocky relationship, which hit a low point after McConnell refused to endorse Trump’s claim that the 2020 election was stolen…. In addition to voting to unwind Trump’s tariff on Canada, McConnell voted against Pete Hegseth, Tulsi Gabbard and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump's nominees to head the Department of Defense, serve as director of national intelligence, and lead the Department of Health and Human Services, respectively."

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Read Alexander Bolton's full article for The Hill at this link.