This time, the astute Republican of Kentucky has a super cap with high expenses and is prepared to use it.
“What I’m looking for is someone who can win in November,” McConnell told CNN. “I don’t care who they like or dislike. Can they win in November? So it’s not an ideological thing. It’s not a ‘who do you think will be nominated for ’24’ thing. Can you win in November? ? ”
And questioned whether his super ally PAC, the Senate Leadership Fund, will spend a lot of money in the primaries to help his favorite candidates, McConnell said bluntly, “Only if necessary.”
Republicans say it may be necessary. With an increasing number of complicated primaries emerging and Trump eager to support candidates who fit his type of policy, leading Republicans are well aware that intra-party wars can produce weak candidates for general elections and undermine their efforts to retake the majority. Senate, something that happened in the 2010 and 2012 elections.
In particular, Republican Party sources say McConnell is courting Arizona Governor Doug Ducey to consider a candidacy, although the Republican Governor – whom Trump attacked furiously for certifying President Joe Biden’s electoral victory there – said he would not challenge Democratic Senator Mark Kelly.
In other states, McConnell and other leading Republicans are closely monitoring the decisions of candidates who could reunite the party’s belligerent wings, such as Governor Chris Sununu in New Hampshire and former Nevada Attorney General Adam Laxalt, which Republican sources say. be considering a dispute against Democratic Senator Catherine Cortez Masto.
Fears about a candidate in Missouri
The scandal of ex-Republican governor Eric Greitens raised concerns among a number of Republicans in Missouri and Washington politics as he courted pro-Trump voices in the media and suggested a potential offer.
The fear: Greens could emerge from a crowded primary field and put a safe Republican chair at risk, just as Republican Todd Akin did when he lost to Democrat Claire McCaskill almost a decade ago.
“There is a lot of concern about what happened in the past,” said Representative Vicky Hartzler, a Republican from Missouri who is considering running for the seat, to CNN when asked about the Greitens. “So I hope that Missouri will have someone where these issues are not distractions and focus on the priorities of the people of the state.”
Others sidestepped questions about vulnerabilities perceived by the Greens and praised their own strengths.
“I think I’m the best candidate,” said Rep. Jason Smith, a Missouri Republican who is eyeing a dispute when asked about the Greens.
It is not yet known how Trump responds. Blunt told CNN that the former president privately encouraged the senator in the past few days to run again and said, “I will do everything I can to help you” to win, and called Blunt again after the veteran Republican surprised the political world by announce your retirement earlier this week.
After those calls, Trump was on the phone with Senator Josh Hawley, a junior senator from the Republican Party for Missouri and a former critic of the Greens, where the two discussed the Senate seat.
In an interview with CNN, Hawley avoided criticizing the Greitens – although Hawley asked the governor to step down when he was state attorney general in 2018.
“I think it’s too early to say right now,” said Hawley when asked about the viability of the Greens as candidates in a general election. “I don’t think the field has taken shape. I have no well-thought-out ideas about any candidate.”
Hawley, who is undecided about supporting a candidate in the race, also says he does not know whether Trump will endorse a Republican for Blunt’s chair.
“There is no math for us that I can imagine where we will lose Missouri and win back the Senate – not with the other seats we have to defend,” said Hawley. “So we have to keep that chair and I think it is fair to say that the former president shares this view.”
“For many of the insiders, the cabal, the establishment, this is their low-profit system,” said Greitens. “I’m not surprised that there are insiders, lobbyists and people from the establishment who don’t want to see us, but we don’t work for them.”
Trump planning more Senate candidate endorsements
Even though Trump’s intentions in Missouri are unclear, the former president is planning a wave of endorsements. He met with Senator Rick Scott of Florida, chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, on his golf course on Thursday, and Trump plans to put his weight on the Republicans he believes fit his mold and have shown loyalty to him while he was in office.
Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican from South Carolina who speaks frequently to the former president, said Trump planned to be heavily involved in the Republican Party’s effort to regain control of the Senate.
“I think you will see him endorse more and more Republicans for re-election,” said Graham. “There are some that he won’t, but most of them he will be, I hope.”
But when asked if Trump would change his mind and support Senator Lisa Murkowski, an Alaskan Republican who voted to convict him during his second impeachment trial, Graham said, “Well, I don’t know about this one.”
Trump publicly and in particular expressed his opposition to Murkowski’s re-election – even with McConnell promising to support her. Still, the moderate Alaskan veteran was shy this week when asked by reporters whether she would run again.
“Well, I have to do this before 2022, right?” she said about making a decision.
Last week, the former president blamed McConnell for losing the Senate in 2020 and called him “the most unpopular politician in the country”. Trump then asked his supporters to contribute their own political apparatus and told Republican campaign committees in Washington to stop using their image to raise funds.
And Trump launched former NFL runner Herschel Walker, who lives in Texas, to run for the Senate in Georgia, injecting a dose of uncertainty into the still-emerging field there.
Trump called former Georgia senator Kelly Loeffler in February after she announced a new group called Greater Georgia, according to a source familiar with the call. Loeffler, former deputy Doug Collins and other Republicans like Walker are considering running against Georgia’s Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock in 2022.
Republican strategists warn that the ex-president’s continued effort to impose his will on the Republican Party, shaping primaries across the country with the candidates most loyal to him, could undermine the effort to win back the Senate.
In addition to Blunt, four Republican senators – Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, Richard Burr of North Carolina, Rob Portman of Ohio and Richard Shelby of Alabama – decided to retire. And many of the Republicans who are competing to replace them are even more indebted to Trump.
“We are losing some real talent,” McConnell told CNN. “We will be trying to bring the majority back with more new faces than I expected.”
“But I think we have a good chance,” added the GOP leader. “I think this government ended up being extremely leftist, which is a godsend for us in terms of controlling the environment of 22.”
Still, Democrats hope that the adoption of Trump by Republicans will help them win seats, even in states like Ohio, which have had a Republican tendency in recent years.
“If Republicans continue to follow the path of Mr. Potato Head and Dr. Seuss, they will fall off a cliff,” said Rep. Tim Ryan, an Ohio Democrat who told CNN that he is “very interested” in a The Senate is running and will make a final decision “in the coming weeks”.
Senate Leadership Fund officials said their stance on intervening in the primaries has not changed from previous cycles.
But this is different from Scott’s plan, with the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee swearing that he “is not getting involved in primaries,” meaning that his group will not endorse candidates or spend money on races in which non-entrants compete in primaries.
Despite Trump’s demand that Republican Party party committees not use their image in fundraising requests, while pushing money for his own political organization, Scott said NRSC fundraising in February was an “impressive blow” and that the Republicans’ positions would bring them back to power.
“The 22nd election will be about issues,” said Scott. “Americans don’t support those men who play women’s sports. They don’t want open borders. They don’t want to close schools. They don’t want to get rid of fossil fuels.”
McConnell is running a manual similar to what he had as a minority leader when Barack Obama was president, seeking to hold his party together against the Democratic agenda, as he did when all Republicans voted against the $ 1.9 relief bill trillion signed this week.
It remains to be seen whether this tactic will succeed in giving him back the title of majority leader.
Asked if he would run for leadership again at the next Congress, McConnell kept his letters closed.
“I don’t think I’m going to answer that right now,” he said with a laugh.
CNN’s Olanma Mang and Ali Zaslav contributed to this report.