Free Republic

The budget agreement announced yesterday increases spending, raises taxes, and funds Obamacare for two years. It has the support of President Obama, Harry Reid, and countless Democrats in Washington. What is Mitch McConnell doing to stop it? Nothing. In fact, McConnell was completely silent on the deal yesterday. Mitch McConnell may vote against the deal so he can pretend to be a conservative, but don't be fooled. He wants the deal to pass. He made it clear that he won't fight the Democrats on spending and he forced his party to surrender. It's so disappointing because now is the perfect...

Add the Senate’s top Republican to the list of those who will oppose the new budget deal, which conservatives are blasting for blowing through the mandated spending caps on government spending next year. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell will vote against the deal brokered by Republican Rep. Paul Ryan and Democratic Sen. Patty Murray, a knowledgeable source close to the Kentucky Republican told The Daily Caller on Wednesday.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) defended his condemnation of the Senate Conservatives Fund on Tuesday and stressed that despite his disputes with the organization he remains a fan of the tea party movement at large. “Let me make it clear: I’m a big fan of the tea party movement. It’s been extremely important in helping us regain the House and do well in the Senate in 2010,” McConnell told Fox News’s Neil Cavuto.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) "lit into" Midland University President and Nebraska Senate candidate Ben Sasse in a private sit-down meeting for associating himself with the Senate Conservatives Fund, according to a report in National Review on Monday. Sasse, who is running in the Republican primary for Senate, sat down with McConnell on November 12 to try and extinguish some tension between the two over his association with SCF and also a YouTube video Sasse posted in which he said that called for "every Republican in Washington, starting with Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, to show some actual leadership." SCF...

Kentucky U.S Senate candidate Matt Bevin beat incumbent Mitch McConnell in a straw poll conducted by the Boone County Republican Party. The unscientific survey was held at the group's gala on Thursday which featured libertarian speaker Judge Andrew Napolitano among others. Of the approximately 425 people who participated, Bevin won 85 percent compared to just 13 percent favoring McConnell. Boone County GOP Chairman Rick Brueggermann says it is unclear if any solid prediction can be drawn from the results ahead of the May primary next year, but that members were eager to participate. "It's not random sampling, but it is...

-snip- But on Friday, a conservative group blamed McConnell and what they said was his “weakness” as a minority leader for allowing Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to go nuclear. -snip- “Harry Reid did this because he knows Republican Leader Mitch McConnell will let him get away with it,” SCF Executive Director Matt Hoskins wrote in an email to the group’s supporters. “The only way to deter a nuclear attack is to make it clear that the response will be equally devastating. Unfortunately, weakness is the only message Mitch McConnell has sent the Democrats on this issue,” Hoskins wrote. McConnell’s...

WASHINGTON — Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said Democrats would get their comeuppance for changing the filibuster rules curbing the power of the minority in the 2014 election. “The solution to this problem is an election,” McConnell said at a Thursday press conference after the Senate voted to go nuclear, changing the rules of the filibuster. “The solution to this problem’s at the ballot box,” McConnell said. “We look forward to having a great election in November 2014.” The Minority Leader would not say whether or not he would change the rules back if Republicans won the majority in 2014....

Two days after a conservative political action committee endorsed his Republican challenger, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell was gifted a trump card in the form of Florida Sen. Marco Rubio. Rubio, like Kentucky’s junior Sen. Rand Paul, has enjoyed immense support from the Tea Party wing of the Republican Party, and his endorsement of McConnell on Fox News Sunday gives the embattled senior senator some much-needed cover. Rubio’s backing comes at a critical time for McConnell.

President Obama phoned Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on Monday as senators worked to finalize a deal that could reopen the government and raise the debt ceiling. Neither White House nor congressional aides would provide details of the discussion, which came despite the president cancelation of a planned afternoon meeting with McConnell and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on Tuesday declined to take sides in the squabble among House Republicans over a government shutdown. Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) has tried to convince his colleagues to support legislation that would keep the government open after Oct. 1 while forcing the Senate to vote on defunding ObamaCare. That approach was dismissed by the right wing of his conference, and now 70 House conservatives are supporting an effort to tie a one-year defunding of ObamaCare to the government funding resolution. McConnell, who crafted deals to end the 2011 debt-ceiling standoff and the 2012 fight over...

Republican Senate candidate Matt Bevin launched a Facebook petition Tuesday to demand that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) sign a letter by Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) vowing to block legislation to keep the federal government open unless it defunds the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare. “Over the past couple of days, Sen. McConnell has been asked repeatedly whether he will support Sen. Mike Lee’s effort to defund Obamacare before its implementation on October 1st, and each time, Sen. McConnell has refused to answer," Bevin said. "It is truly sad to see the minority leader of the U.S. Senate so...

It’s only just begun, but the reelection battle of Mitch McConnell – the top Republican in the Senate – is already shaping up to be the marquee race of the 2014 midterms. Start with the primary challenge Senator McConnell faces from Matt Bevin, a wealthy, tea-party-backed businessman, reportedly willing to spend his own money. If McConnell makes it past Mr. Bevin, he’s poised to face likely Democratic nominee Alison Lundergan Grimes, Kentucky’s secretary of state and member of a well-connected political family, in the general election. Add to the mix McConnelll’s mediocre job approval ratings in the state – only...

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s chief of staff is stepping down from his position to focus exclusively on the GOP leader’s reelection campaign and the national Republican effort to take back the majority next year. The move, Republicans say, is a reflection of the growing belief — and concern — that 2014 could be the last opportunity in years for the GOP to recapture the Senate after blowing their chance at the majority in the past two election cycles. So McConnell is moving a key aide out of his official Washington office to work entirely on campaign politics. Continue Reading...

Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., looks to be headed into one of the toughest campaigns of his political career, as his Democratic opponent, Alison Lundergan Grimes, leads him in his 2014 re-election race, according to a new poll. A survey by the Democratic polling firm Public Policy Polling shows Grimes with 45 percent support and McConnell with 44 percent, Kentucky's Courier-Journal reports. The poll was paid for by two groups who oppose McConnell, the Progressive Change Campaign Committee and Democracy for America, according to the Courier-Journal. [READ: Poll: Mitch McConnell Trounces Challengers] Grimes, 34, is Kentucky's secretary of state who announced...

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) said Tuesday he has yet to decide whether to support a proposal to block government funding if it includes money for ObamaCare.Tea Party Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Mike Lee (R-Utah) have ratcheted up the pressure on McConnell to threaten a government shutdown if Democrats refuse to relent on the healthcare overhaul. McConnell told reporters he’s in the midst of discussions about government funding, which will expire at the end of September, and the national debt limit, projected to run out at year’s end.“We’ve had a lot of internal discussions about...

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has promised to filibuster new gun control legislation, putting up a significant roadblock to Democratic efforts to move forward on the measure this week. ... McConnell is now the 15th Senator to sign on to the Republican gun control filibuster, an effort that has been spearheaded by conservative Sens. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), Ted Cruz (R-Texas), and Mike Lee (R-Utah). As the top Senate Republican, McConnell's support gives the filibuster a much higher chance of success, imperiling the already-delicate bipartisan negotiations on new gun control measures. McConnell's promise to filibuster also deflates criticism from the more...

<p>FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) — U.S. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell is gearing up for a tough re-election fight next year in Kentucky.</p> <p>He wants to prevent one, too.</p> <p>McConnell is trying to head off a GOP primary challenge by cozying up to the tea party. He's also trying to scare off potential Democratic contenders — actress Ashley Judd is one — by providing a glimpse of his no-holds-barred political tactics.</p>

U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell made the following remarks on the Senate floor Monday regarding the need for the President in his State of the Union address to address the real consequences of Obamacare and offer solutions to avoid the sequester.

A new poll shows Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell is struggling to retain support among voters. The Courier-Journal Bluegrass Poll shows that twice as many voters are against McConnell as there are supporting him. It also finds that only one-third of Republicans support him in the 2014 election.