Jen Psaki: ‘Real legacy’ of Mitch McConnell is ‘a cynic focused on power’

MSNBC’s Jen Psaki slammed Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell’s (Ky.) “real legacy” as that of a “cynic focused on power.”

Psaki discussed McConnell’s announcement last week that he would be stepping down from his leadership role in the Senate Republican Conference next November. She said on “Inside with Jen Psaki” that his latest news is the “perfect moment” to discuss his legacy, “specifically his unwavering devotion to winning and winning at any cost.”

In heated remarks, Psaki suggested that McConnell was for or against issues based on how politically beneficial they were to him. 

“He was for campaign finance reform before he realized that opposing it would mean raising far more unrestricted money, and that could politically be helpful to him. He was for voting rights until he realized that suppressing the vote might help Republicans win elections,” she said. 

She then pointed to McConnell holding up former President Obama’s nomination of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court for 11 months in 2016, saying, at the time, it should be the choice of the American people in November.

“But that didn’t last long. Fast forward just a couple of years to 2020 when he flipped on his own McConnell rule to rush Amy Coney Barrett into the court just weeks before the election, because it’s never been about sticking with principles for him. It’s been about power,” she added.

She also said McConnell saw Trump as a “means to an end” because he could nominate conservatives to federal courts. She also noted that despite McConnell saying Trump was responsible for the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, he voted to acquit him in his second impeachment case.

“And so, Mitch McConnell, [who] was arguably the most powerful figure in the Republican Party, is leaving his post as Republican Senate Leader diminished. That’s apparent from the lack of action on new Ukraine aid despite his insistence and his inability to keep his conference together to pass a bipartisan border bill, which tanked at the behest of Donald Trump,” she said. 

“And yet, despite all that, McConnell thinks about Trump, which we know he’s already said that if he is the Republican nominee, he will support him. And that’s the real legacy of Mitch McConnell, a cynic focused on power only to be swallowed by the monster that he enabled to obtain it,” she concluded.

The Hill has reached out to McConnell’s office for comment.