Mitch McConnell reportedly said he was “exhilarated” that Donald Trump had “totally discredited himself” just hours after the Capitol riot on January 6th.
This, according to excerpts from a new book titled, “This Will Not Pass,” obtained by the Washington Post.
“I feel exhilarated by the fact that this fellow finally, totally discredited himself,” the anti-Trump Republican Minority Leader McConnell told New York Times reporter Jonathan Martin, one of the book’s authors.
“He put a gun to his head and pulled the trigger,” the Senate Minority Leader allegedly said at the time. “Couldn’t have happened at a better time.”
Hours after a mob ransacked the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell described himself as “exhilarated” about the potential damage to then-president Donald Trump. https://t.co/61mcyKKcmT
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) April 26, 2022
RELATED: Report: Mitch McConnell Wants A Truce With Donald Trump
Mitch McConnell ‘Exhilarated’ After Capitol Riot
Mitch McConnell’s reaction to the Capitol riot seems counter to everything we’ve been told about how serious the attack was.
How could somebody be ‘exhilarated’ on the worst day in American history since the Civil War? On the day AOC was literally almost murdered? A day that moved the ever-stoic Adam Kinzinger to tears?
McConnell was celebrating the political fallout? That’s simply reprehensible and something you’d expect from the Democrat Party.
Speaking of Democrats who never let a crisis go to waste …
McConnell, according to the same Washington Post report, was considering a joint statement with Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) warning the former President to stay away from Joe Biden’s inauguration.
It gets worse.
McConnell reportedly was “eager” to obtain information from Martin on the prospect of Cabinet members and then-Vice President Mike Pence invoking the 25th Amendment to remove Trump from office.
“What do you hear about the Twenty-Fifth Amendment?” he asked.
There is something so funny about Mitch McConnell going up to Olivia Nuzzi or someone and being like “so have you heard anything about the 25th amendment out of the White House?” https://t.co/jn9VKojgJ0 pic.twitter.com/Qk31RzuyZQ
— Ben Dreyfuss (@bendreyfuss) April 22, 2022
RELATED: Mitch McConnell At Odds With Trump: Opposes Pardons For January 6 Rioters
McConnell Wanted to Rid GOP of Trump
The Political Insider wrote one week after the January 6 riot that Mitch McConnell had been “pleased” about Democrats drafting articles of impeachment.
Multiple sources had observed McConnell claiming he was “done” and “furious” with Trump.
The Kentucky Republican “told associates that impeachment will help rid the Republican Party of Trump and his movement.”
Trump’s “movement” being a record number of voters for a Republican president.
RINOs ready to join with Radical Dems to destroy the Republican Party: McConnell furious with president, supports move to initiate impeachment proceedings: sources https://t.co/R3isoLbQ9Q #FoxNews
— Lou Dobbs (@LouDobbs) January 13, 2021
McConnell, along with a majority of Republicans, later voted that the impeachment trial of Donald Trump was unconstitutional.
The Senate just voted on my constitutional point of order.
45 Senators agreed that this sham of a “trial” is unconstitutional.
That is more than will be needed to acquit and to eventually end this partisan impeachment process.
This “trial” is dead on arrival in the Senate.
— Rand Paul (@RandPaul) January 26, 2021
Trump ravaged the GOP leader about a month afterward, issuing a statement saying McConnell is “a dour, sullen and unsmiling political hack.”
By the end of February, McConnell said he would “absolutely” support Trump if he were the Republican nominee for president in 2024.
BREAKING: President Trump Releases Statement Slamming Mitch McConnell
Vows to back America First primary candidates pic.twitter.com/sBNsio5Xwz
— Jack Posobiec ?? (@JackPosobiec) February 16, 2021
Despite that ‘absolute’ support, McConnell and Trump have continued to be at odds over the severity of what happened during the Capitol riot.
Trump has indicated he would consider pardons for January 6 rioters should he run for and win the presidential election in 2024.
“If I run, and if I win, we will treat those people from January 6 fairly. We will treat them fairly,” he vowed. “If that requires pardons, we will give them pardons, because they are being treated so unfairly.”
BREAKING: President Trump promises to PARDON Jan. 6 prisoners if he runs and wins in 2024 pic.twitter.com/teYbYNBcuB
— RSBN ?? (@RSBNetwork) January 30, 2022
The Senate Minority Leader vociferously objected to that plan.
“My view is, I would not be in favor of shortening any of the sentences for any of the people who pleaded guilty to crimes,” McConnell said.
The Washington Post goes on to note that McConnell had been gearing up for a fight with Trump and his supporters following the Capitol riot.
They claim he told staff members that the former President is a “despicable person” and that he would “take him on politically.”
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“We crushed the sons of b****es,” McConnell said of conservative candidates in the 2014 midterms. “And that’s what we’re going to do in the primary in ’22.”
Trump slammed McConnell in a statement saying he no longer represents the Republican Party.
“Mitch McConnell does not speak for the Republican Party and does not represent the views of the vast majority of its voters,” he wrote.
