President Trump on Thursday blasted Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) for his vote opposing Well being and Human Services and products Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., pushing aside his adolescence bout with polio and wondering his psychological talents.
“I was the one that got him to drop out of the leadership position, so he can’t love me. But he’s not voting against Bobby, he’s voting against me. But that’s all right. He endorsed me. You know that Mitch endorsed me, right?” Trump advised newshounds, crediting himself for McConnell shedding his Senate GOP management place.
CNN’s Kaitlan Collins identified that McConnell had polio, which the Kentucky Republican mentioned influenced his resolution to vote in opposition to Kennedy.
“I don’t know anything about, he had polio, he had polio,” Trump mentioned.
Collins requested Trump if he was once doubting that McConnell had polio, which Trump brushed aside.
“I have no idea if he had polio. All I can tell you about him is he shouldn’t have been leader, he knows that. He voted against Bobby. He votes against almost everything. He’s a very bitter guy,” the president mentioned.
“We have a very strong party, and he’s almost not even really a very powerful member. … He’s lost his power,” he added.
McConnell issued a blistering indictment of Kennedy, an established anti-vaccine activist, announcing he has watched how vaccines can save lives. McConnell was once the one Republican to vote no on Kennedy’s nomination, regardless of different senators indicating they’d lingering considerations about Kennedy’s vaccine perspectives.
McConnell was once additionally the lone GOP no vote in opposition to Tulsi Gabbard as director of nationwide intelligence and one in all handiest 3 Republicans who adverse Pete Hegseth as Protection secretary.
McConnell on RFK Jr.: ‘I will not condone the relitigation of proven cures’
Kennedy was once sworn in throughout a rite within the Oval Administrative center in a while Thursday.
“I feel sorry for Mitch. And I was one of the people that led — he wanted to go to the end, and he wanted to stay leader,” Trump mentioned Thursday.
He added, “He’s not equipped, mentally. He wasn’t equipped 10 years ago, mentally, in my opinion. He let the Republican Party go to hell. If I didn’t come along, the Republican Party wouldn’t even exist right now. Mitch McConnell never really had it.”
Trump mentioned McConnell was once in a position to boost cash as chief, so he had “a little loyalty” from GOP senators as a result of he may give them a spice up in campaigns.
“Senators would call me, and they’d say, ‘He wants to give me $20, $25 million. Can I take it?’ I’d say, ‘Take the money,’” Trump recalled.
McConnell dropped his management publish on the finish of the closing Congress, and GOP Chief John Thune (S.D.) was once elected in November to interchange him. McConnell’s spouse, Elaine Chao, served as Trump’s Transportation secretary from 2017 to 2021 and resigned following the Jan. 6, 2021, assaults at the U.S. Capitol.