Senat Partai Republik harus memilih antara cara McConnell dan pemula MAGA | Politik berita

A version of this story appeared in Berita’s What Matters newsletter.

To get it in your inbox, sign up for free here. Berita  —  On the heels of the general election last week, there’s another important vote on tap this Wednesday in Washington that will greatly impact what President-elect Donald Trump can accomplish during his four years in office: Republicans in the Senate will vote by secret ballot to choose a new leader.

Trump will also be in Washington, meeting in the morning with House Republicans and then traveling to the White House to meet with President Joe Biden.

In this April 12 photo, Donald Trump listens as House Speaker Mike Johnson speaks during a press conference at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida.

Joe Raedle/Getty Images Related article Trump looms large as Congress faces shutdown threat and ‘dizzying’ to-do list Come January, Republicans will control the Senate.

While Trump has not endorsed a candidate in the Senate leadership race, he has called on senators to cede him some power and commit to allowing him to appoint Cabinet secretaries in recess appointments – a way for presidents to essentially bypass Congress that is a break from recent practice.

Trump’s most vocal supporters are organizing behind Florida Sen.

Rick Scott, a controversial figure who is still viewed as the long-shot option.

The more establishment options are Sen.

John Thune of South Dakota and Sen.

John Cornyn of Texas.

The rare leadership battle is unique for senators, since it is playing out not just behind closed doors in the Capitol but also in public on conservative media.

Ultimately, the question for Republican lawmakers is whether they want to pick a leader who has years of experience in the arcane practices of the Senate or a leader who was early to tap into the MAGA movement.

End of the McConnell era Sen.

Mitch McConnell, 82, is the longest-serving Senate party leader in US history, having been the top Republican in the chamber since the tail end of the George W.

Bush administration.

History may remember him most for engineering a conservative majority on the US Supreme Court, refusing to allow then-President Barack Obama’s nominee to get a vote with a delay in 2016 and then quickly ramming through a nominee, Trump’s third, one week before Trump lost the 2020 election.

McConnell will stay in the chamber until his term ends in 2026 but has cleared the way for a new generation of leaders to deal with Trump.

McConnell has admitted that his brand of Republicanism seems out of place in Trump’s populist version of the party.

US Sen.

Mitch McConnell is photographed at the US Capitol in 2018.

Damon Winter/The New York Times McConnell's first wife, Sherrill Redmon, wipes away lipstick after she gave her husband a congratulatory kiss in November 1977.

He had just won a race to be the judge-executive in Jefferson County, Kentucky.

He served in that role until 1985.

Jay Mather/The Courier Journal/USA Today Network McConnell talks with children as he tours the Minor Lane Heights area of Jefferson County in June 1979.

He was joined on the tour by his 6-year-old daughter, Elly, seen at left.

Stewart Bowman/The Courier Journal/USA Today Network McConnell celebrates after he defeated incumbent Walter "Dee" Huddleston for a US Senate seat in November 1984.

Adrienne Helitzer/The Courier Journal/USA Today Network McConnell poses for a portrait in 1987.

CQ Roll Call/Getty Images McConnell, left, and aides Steve Johnson, center, Mike Mitchell set up a cot in the senator's office as they prepare for another night of a Senate filibuster in February 1988.

Republicans were filibustering against campaign spending legislation.

John Duricka/AP McConnell stands with fiancée Elaine Chao just before they were married in the US Capitol chapel in February 1993.

The wedding was a private ceremony attended by their families.

Chao, who at the time was president of the United Way of America, would later serve as secretary of the Department of Labor under President George W.

Bush, deputy secretary of the Department of Transportation under President George H.W.

Bush, and secretary of the Department of Transportation under President Donald Trump.

Shayna Brennan/AP McConnell, left, and US Sen.

Richard Bryan stand behind volumes detailing the Senate Ethics Committee's investigation of Sen.

Bob Packwood in September 1995.

The committee recommended that Packwood be expelled from Congress because of sexual and official misconduct.

Ten women had accused him of sexual harassment.

At the urging of even his closest colleagues, Packwood resigned.

John Duricka/AP From left, McConnell and fellow Sens.

Pete Domenici and Dianne Feinstein appear on CBS' "Face the Nation" in January 1999.

Karin Cooper/Hulton Archive/Getty Images McConnell and Sen.

Kay Bailey Hutchison walk in a Capitol hallway during the Senate impeachment trial of President Bill Clinton in February 1999.

David Hume Kennerly/Getty Images McConnell stands near a map of Cambodia made with the skulls of Khmer Rouge victims during his visit to the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, in March 1999.

McConnell had met with Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen and said that US aid would be at risk if a trial of Khmer Rouge leaders did not measure up to international standards.

Darren Whiteside/Reuters McConnell, right, is given a personal tour of a gaseous diffusion plant near Paducah, Kentucky, in August 1999.

The plant produced enriched uranium until 2013.

Seth Dixon/The Paducah Sun/AP McConnell, right, and US Sen.

Chris Dodd drive ceremonial first nails into an inauguration platform at the US Capitol in December 2000.

Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call/Getty Images Vice President Dick Cheney jokes with McConnell and his wife, Elaine Chao, at his swearing-in reenactment in January 2003.

Mark Wilson/Getty Images McConnell walks outside the Supreme Court in September 2003.

McConnell was a survivor of polio as a child and has long walked with a slight limp.

Doug Mills/The New York Times/Redux McConnell, right, and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, left, meet with Supreme Court nominee John Roberts at the US Capitol in July 2005.

McConnell at the time was Senate Republican Whip.

He would replace Frist as GOP leader in 2007.

Joe Raedle/Getty Images McConnell sits in his office during an interview in November 2006.

Doug Mills/The New York Times/Redux McConnell, left, walks off Air Force One with President George W.

Bush after arriving in Louisville, Kentucky, in March 2007.

Charles Dharapak/AP McConnell and Chao greet supporters after learning that he had won reelection in November 2008.

Mark Lyons/Getty Images McConnell, second from left, attends an Oval Office meeting about an impending Supreme Court vacancy in May 2009.

From left are US Sen.

Jeff Sessions, McConnell, Vice President Joe Biden, President Barack Obama, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and US Sen.

Patrick Leahy.

McConnell boldly blocked Merrick Garland, Obama's choice for the Supreme Court, and later worked to install Trump's pick Neil Gorsuch instead.

Jason Reed/Reuters McConnell holds an empty binder strap while speaking about health-care reform on Capitol Hill in December 2009.

McConnell and Sen.

John McCain said that Republicans senators would do everything they could to delay passage of any health-care legislation.

Mark Wilson/Getty Images McConnell speaks to a NATO training mission adviser as he visits a military training cernter in Kabul, Afghanistan, in January 2011.

Ho New/Reuters McConnell and Sen.

Roy Blount walk to a Senate vote in April 2012.

Win McNamee/Getty Images McConnell speaks with a US Capitol tour group from Beechwood, Kentucky, in October 2013.

Mark Wilson/Getty Images McConnell carries a musket on stage as he speaks at the Conservative Political Action Conference in March 2014.

Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call/Getty Images McConnell hugs Betty Lou Weddle, 82, after speaking to a small audience in Liberty, Kentucky, in May 2014.

Matt Stone/The Courier Journal/USA Today Network McConnell eats at Morris' Deli, his regular lunch spot in Louisville, in August 2014.

Jeff Brown McConnell, left, sits across the aisle from Democratic Senate leader Harry Reid before a joint session of Congress in March 2015.

Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images In August 2015, McConnell holds up a selfie photo that he took with Kentucky Gov.

Steve Beshear, left, the year before.

McConnell reminded Beshear that he falsely predicted that McConnell would lose his Senate race and retire.

McConnell signed the photo for Beshear, who was term-limited and would be leaving office before him.

Sam Upshaw Jr./The Courier Journal/USA Today Network McConnell walks with President-elect Donald Trump and his wife, Melania, after a meeting at the Capitol in November 2016.

Molly Riley/AP McConnell leaves the Senate chamber in September 2018 after the Senate Judiciary Committee advanced Brett Kavanaugh's nomination for the Supreme Court.

Jacquelyn Martin/AP McConnell holds his notes as he listens to a question from a reporter in October 2019.

Jacquelyn Martin/AP McConnell and Trump shake hands at a campaign rally in Lexington, Kentucky, in November 2019.

Yuri Gripas/Reuters McConnell, left, rides the Senate subway between meetings in July 2020.

Jacquelyn Martin/AP McConnell, right, walks past armed police at the US Capitol after the riot on January 6, 2021.

Erin Scott/Bloomberg/Getty Images House impeachment managers watch McConnell speak in February 2021 after the Senate voted to acquit Trump in his second impeachment trial.

McConnell voted not guilty, saying he didn't think the Senate had the "power to convict and disqualify a former office holder who is now a private citizen." But he still put blame on Trump.

"There's no question — none — that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day," McConnell said.

"No question about it.

The people who stormed this building believed they were acting on the wishes and instructions of their president." Erin Schaff/The New York Times/Redux McConnell and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy speak to reporters outside the White House after meeting with President Joe Biden in May 2021.

Evan Vucci/AP Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, left, greets McConnell and other US senators who were visiting Ukraine in May 2022.

Ukrainian Presidential Press Service McConnell speaks to reporters at the Capitol after meeting with Biden and congressional leaders at the White House in November 2022.

Drew Angerer/Getty Images McConnell and Biden shake hands in Covington, Kentucky, after speaking about Biden's infrastructure agenda under the Clay Wade Bailey Bridge in January 2023.

Patrick Semansky/AP US Sen.

John Barrasso reaches out to help McConnell after McConnell froze and stopped talking during a news conference at the Capitol in July 2023.

McConnell was led away from the news conference and toward his office by an aide.

He returned a few minutes later and continued.

Drew Angerer/Getty Images In pictures: Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell Prev Next Trump and McConnell tangled frequently, especially after the storming of the Capitol on January 6, 2021.

McConnell did not ultimately vote to convict Trump during an impeachment trial, but he did say Trump was “disgraceful.” Trump went on to criticize McConnell and use racist language to describe McConnell’s wife, Elaine Chao, who served as Transportation secretary in Trump’s first Cabinet.

The duality of McConnell is that he has both criticized Trump – he told a recent biographer Trump was a “sleazeball” and that the MAGA movement is wrong – and also capitalized on Trump’s ascent, helped protect Trump as president in his first term and ultimately backed his run for the White House this year.

“We are all on the same team now,” he said.

McConnell will also be remembered for how the Senate changed during his leadership, when use of the filibuster exploded and was employed to blockade the opposing party.

Multiple Democrats endorsed nuking the filibuster during Biden’s administration, given their slim Senate majority.

Come January, they will rely on it to block Trump’s agenda.

After Trump’s victory last week, McConnell said he was confident that the filibuster would be in safe hands with a Republican majority.

A big decision for Republican senators Senate Republicans could move in wildly different directions, depending on who replaces McConnell.

Thune is McConnell’s No.

2, the Republican whip, and Cornyn previously held that role.

Both were first elected to the Senate during the Bush administration and have spent decades as senators.

Both have at times been critical of Trump, who once called on Republicans in South Dakota to launch a primary challenge against Thune.

U.S.

Senator Ted Cruz campaigns to a crowd of supporters at a get-out-the-vote rally in Brenham, Texas, U.S.

October 30, 2024.

Evan Garcia/Reuters Related article Conservative firebrands set to chair key Senate committees in new Congress Having lived through periods in the majority and the minority, both Thune and Cornyn might be unwilling to drastically change the status quo in the Senate.

Scott, on the other hand, wants drastic change.

“We have got to change the way the Senate is run to get Trump’s agenda done,” he said on Fox News.

While it’s ultimately Republican senators voting in secret who will choose their leader, Scott has tried to mobilize Trump’s followers to make the leadership race part of the Trump movement.

“Right now, it’s really just the Washington establishment versus the Republicans that want to elect Trump,” Scott told the right-wing provocateur Laura Loomer on her podcast.

Thune seemed to reject the establishment vs.

insurgent view in an opinion piece for Fox News, arguing that Republicans would have to set aside differences to deliver on Trump’s agenda in the face of what will surely be unified opposition from Democrats.

“If we don’t successfully execute on our mandate, we risk losing the coalition that swept Republicans into office up and down the ballot,” Thune wrote.

Cornyn is taking a very different approach.

“I’m not going to do this in the press,” he told Berita’s Lauren Fox.

But the candidates have been laying groundwork for months.

Berita’s Capitol Hill team noted last week that Thune and Cornyn worked hard during the campaign season to help GOP colleagues.

Cornyn appeared next to Trump during Trump’s trips to Texas, and Thune met with Trump at Mar-a-Lago in Florida.

Scott only got 10 votes when he ran against McConnell in 2022 even though he had the backing of Trump back then.

Thune and Cornyn, on the other hand, have been waiting in line for years.