Trump slams McConnell as ‘disloyal’ amid Jan. 6 hearings

Former President Trump on Thursday vented his anger with Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) during the House select Jan. 6 committee’s hearing, slamming him as a “disloyal sleazebag” despite the recent victories McConnell helped secure for Trump’s legacy.

Trump appeared to lose his temper after the Jan. 6 committee played a clip of McConnell’s speech on the Senate floor during Trump’s second impeachment trial in which he blamed the former president for inciting the attack on the U.S. Capitol. 

“Is this the same Mitch McConnell who was losing big in Kentucky, and came to the White House to BEG me for an Endorsement and help? Without me he would have lost in a landslide. A disloyal sleaze bag!” Trump posted on Truth Social, his social media platform.  

Trump appeared to be referring to the 2020 election, but McConnell never faced any serious danger from his Democratic challenger Amy McGrath. He wound up winning a seventh Senate term by a margin of nearly 20 points.

Trump’s vitriolic attack on the GOP leader came only a week after Democrats formally abandoned their plans to reverse the 2017 tax cuts, one of Trump’s biggest domestic accomplishments.  

McConnell mentioned the importance of preserving Trump’s tax cuts at a press conference on Tuesday.  

“One day we think they’re going to leave taxes alone, which of course would preserve the 2017 tax bill, the next day they’re not so sure,” McConnell said of Democrats’ plans to move a budget reconciliation package.  

McConnell also played a key role in helping Trump add three conservative justices to the Supreme Court — Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett — who joined a 6-3 conservative majority in overturning Roe v. Wade last month. 

Yet, Trump remains fixated on McConnell’s refusal to acknowledge his unfounded claims that the 2020 election was stolen as well as on the GOP leader’s fiery denunciation of Trump’s actions leading to the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.  

McConnell excoriated Trump at the end of his second impeachment trial for what he called a “disgraceful dereliction of duty.”  

The Jan. 6 committee on Thursday played a clip of McConnell speaking on the Senate floor in which he said “there’s no question, none, that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day.” 

“The people who stormed this building believed they were acting on the wishes and instructions of the president,” he said. “Having that belief was a foreseeable consequence of the growing crescendo of false statements, conspiracy theories and reckless hyperbole which the defeated president kept shouting into the largest megaphone on planet Earth.”  

McConnell has since declined to speak about Trump or even mention him by name in public. 

On Tuesday when asked whether he would oppose Trump’s candidacy for president in 2024 if he runs again, McConnell only predicted that the former president would face a lot of competition for the nomination. 

“I think we’re going to have a crowded field for president. I assume most of that will unfold later and people will be picking their candidates in a crowded primary field,” he told reporters.