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- Trump continued to rail against McConnell in an interview with The Washington Post.
- "McConnell is only a leader because he raises a lot of money," Trump said. "That's his primary power."
- Trump has called for McConnell's removal as minority leader, but no Republican senators have joined him.
Former President Donald Trump told The Washington Post that the only reason Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is at the helm of the Senate's Republican caucus is that he "raises a lot of money."
This insult from Trump is just the latest in the former president's campaign to delegitimize and oust McConnell from his position. This effort stems from his anger over the Kentucky lawmaker's refusal to indulge his claims of voter fraud past December 15, 2020, when McConnell – still the majority leader at the time – declared President Joe Biden to have won the 2020 election.
"Many millions of us had hoped the presidential election would yield a different result, but our system of government has processes to determine who will be sworn in," McConnell said the day after the Electoral College certified Biden's victory. "So today I want to congratulate President-elect Joe Biden."
"You lost the election, the Electoral College has spoken," McConnell told Trump in their last conversation that day, according to a recently-published book. The two have not spoken since.
"He didn't fight at all," Trump told The Post in reference to McConnell's floor speech. "He gave up immediately."
-Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) December 15, 2020
And, according to Trump, McConnell's power comes only from his ability to raise large sums of money.
"McConnell is only a leader because he raises a lot of money," he told The Post. "You know, with the senators, that's how it is, frankly. That's his primary power."
In September, Trump began calling for McConnell's removal as minority leader, saying he's "he's very bad for the Republican Party." But so far, no Republicans backed him up on that.
And while the former president remains highly influential among House Republicans, some of whom are going as far as purchasing stock in a SPAC for Trump's new social media platform, Republicans in the Senate don't appear to be as swayed by Trump's missives.
In October, Insider spoke with several Republican senators after Trump accused McConnell of "folding to the Democrats" by proposing a deal to raise the debt ceiling. Most Republican senators shrugged off Trump's remarks, with Trump ally Sen. Ron Johnson pointing out "he's not here right now."
Ultimately, 11 Republicans voted that day to break a filibuster and allow Democrats to raise the debt ceiling.
McConnell's office did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.