Mitch McConnell waves the white flag (it’s a trap!)
Senate Republicans put Rick Scott, who is best known for defrauding billions of dollars from Medicare before he entered politics, in charge of their midterm fundraising – and now they’re shocked to learn that the money has disappeared.
What next? Will the Republicans put Ted Cruz in charge of public relations? Will they hire Matt Gaetz as the babysitter? It’s not just that putting Rick Scott in charge of NRSC funds was an obviously poor decision. It’s that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell either lacked the sense, or lacked the control over his Senate Republican colleagues, to prevent Scott from taking this role in the first place.
No wonder McConnell is now publicly lamenting about how he fears the Republicans will lose the Senate in the midterms. The Democrats have the candidates, momentum, the popularity, and the money, while the Republicans are stuck trying to convince voters to get behind turds like Mehmet Oz, with no budget for trying to pull it off.
Of course McConnell may just be trying to lull us into a false sense of security. For decades, McConnell has consistently used the strategy of starting off every battle by announcing that his side has already won. When a confirmation process is coming up, McConnell insists he has the votes even when he clearly doesn’t, in the hope our side will give up and stop pressuring the swing voters, making it easier for him to find a way to get those votes.
Now McConnell may be playing the opposite game of announcing he’s lost the midterms before we even get into the home stretch. Now is not the time to get complacent. If anything, it’s time to ramp up our efforts. Expanding the Senate is there for the taking if we put in the work. Here are the nine most competitive Senate races. Click all of these links to sign up to help the Democratic candidate in each race:
Pennsylvania – Ohio – Florida – North Carolina – Wisconsin – Arizona – Georgia – New Hampshire – Nevada
Bill Palmer is the publisher of the political news outlet Palmer Report