He froze of all people when a reporter asked him about his future. Mitch McConnell was to answer whether he would stand for re-election in 2026. It was a question that the Republican minority leader in the Senate would otherwise routinely brush away. But he, the powerful counterpart to Donald Trump in the party, has been struggling for months, and a web of rumors and intrigues is already beginning to entwine his future.
He was able to let out his trademark chuckle and say, “Oh, that’s it,” then the 81-year-old fell silent in mid-sentence, in the middle of a media conference in his native Kentucky, which he has represented in the Senate for 38 years. It was the second time in just a few weeks. He froze at a press conference in the Capitol in July, after twenty seconds his employees led him away, and he later returned. On Wednesday, an employee also spoke to McConnell. He refused to walk away and finished the press conference.
McConnell had the freeze explained as a result of a concussion following a fall that broke his arm in a Washington hotel in March, forcing him to take a break of several weeks. McConnell takes seriously the picture the episodes paint of him: the conservative otherwise avoids talking about his health as much as possible; all that is known is that he had once suffered from polio.
Now that McConnell has had public lapses, lawmakers are reporting that similar moments in closed circles have been piling up for months. A group leader who doesn’t seem to follow conversations, whose hearing bothers him more and more, who even dozes off during meetings: the well-meaning McConnell fear that a person with exceptional power is missing the right moment to say goodbye with dignity. And, incidentally, makes it difficult for his party to caricature President Joe Biden as an old man.
Even after 16 years as the Republican leader in the Senate, a record, McConnell doesn’t seem to be thinking about quitting. At least not yet. He is currently on the mission to secure billions in US aid to Ukraine. McConnell steadfastly defends all attacks by the Trump faction on the loan decisions, internally he argues with all his might for the importance of the transatlantic alliance that Russia must not win in order not to encourage China.
The Ukraine mission is also a final act of defiance against Donald Trump, the presidential candidate McConnell so despises. He had repeatedly opposed him, but then supported him at crucial moments, for example when he let the second impeachment conviction in the Senate fail in 2020. McConnell is now increasingly distancing himself from Trump, and he wants to remain the Senate Republican leader until the 2026 election so that his party can put forward the right candidates and not the ones graced by Trump.
With an appearance at a sponsorship event and in telephone conversations with several senators, the Republican has now shown how well he is doing. The Capitol physician has confirmed his fitness to serve, McConnell said. For now, he seems to have calmed the situation down. True, some of his colleagues discussed convening a special session to discuss the future of their leader.
A challenger would probably be easy to find with Rick Scott. Last fall, the Florida senator, fully on Trump’s course, wanted to oust McConnell. But Scott would probably lose again just as clearly as he had lost then: The majority of senators have no interest in exposing their delegation to a dispute over direction between Trump supporters and moderate Republicans. Mitch McConnell, despite or because of his contradictions, is still the best at navigating his party’s contradictions.