McConnell thwarts Scott’s long-shot challenge for Senate GOP leadership

Sen. Mitch McConnell will remain at the helm of Senate Republicans, defeating Sen. Rick Scott’s bid Wednesday to oust him as GOP leader.

After more than three hours of private debate and a failed attempt to postpone the internal leadership elections until after the Dec. 6 Georgia Senate runoff, a clear majority of Senate Republicans chose Mr. McConnell as their leader in a secret ballot contest.

The final tally was 37-10, with one member voting as present.

“I don’t own this job,” Mr. McConnell, Kentucky Republican, told reporters after the vote. “Anybody who wants to run for it can feel free to do so. I’m not in any way offended by having an opponent or having a few votes in opposition.”

The challenge by Mr. Scott, Florida Republican and head of Senate Republicans’ campaign arm, came amid a fierce blame game over the party’s midterm failure to capture the chamber from Democrats.

The marathon election Wednesday was preceded by a similar hours-long discussion the day prior about the future of the Senate GOP conference during which Mr. McConnell and Mr. Scott lobbed criticisms at one another.

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“We’ve made progress in this fight, but there is so much more we could get done, both as individual senators and as a Republican Conference, if we commit to a plan and work together as a team to advance conservative policies and ideas,” Mr. Scott said Wednesday in a statement. 

He and his supporters accused Mr. McConnell of failing to provide them an election-year agenda to campaign on, frequently “caving” to Democrats on bipartisan legislation and a lack of inclusiveness on major policy debates, prompting demands for change from the “status quo.”

“I think for the last two years, the Republican Senate minority did not use all the tools at its disposal [to oppose the Biden administration], and I think that was a mistake,” said Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, who voted for Mr. Scott. “That’s the position I articulated forcefully, that’s what the voters want and expect from us, I believe, is bold, conservative leadership, standing and fighting for them and not merely acquiescing in out-of-control spending that is producing skyrocketing inflation.”

Others who publicly said they sided with Mr. Scott included Sens. Josh Hawley of Missouri, Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, Mike Braun of Indiana and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina. Mr. Cruz’s motion to postpone the elections until after the Georgia Senate runoff was rejected by a majority. 

Mr. McConnell has led his GOP Senate colleagues since 2006 and his victory Wednesday means that, when the new Congress meets in January, he will become the longest-serving party leader in the chamber’s history, dethroning Democrat Mike Mansfield of Montana.

Backers of Mr. McConnell noted that it was Mr. Scott’s job to deliver the party a Senate majority as chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC), and that installing him at the head of the GOP conference would be an example of failing up.

Mr. McConnell rejected one of the common charges against him — that he leads through secret backroom deals. While he suggested there will be no major forthcoming changes, he added that he’s open to “new ideas.”

“We meet three times a week — Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday — and have pretty fulsome discussions,” he told reporters. “There are opportunities all over the place to put new ideas [forward]. I’ve never been opposed to it, and won’t be going forward.”

Mr. McConnell declined to reflect on Mr. Scott’s tenure as NRSC chair but reiterated that the party has had recent trouble winning over centrist voters with Trump-backed candidates.

“Here’s the problem,” he said. “We underperformed among voters who did not like President Biden’s performance among independents and moderate Republicans, who looked at us and concluded — too much chaos, too much negativity. We turned off a lot of these centrist voters, which is why I never predicted a red wave.”

Senate Republicans also held elections for other leadership positions, including reelecting John Thune of South Dakota for minority whip, reelecting John Barrasso of Wyoming for conference chair, electing Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia for vice conference chair, electing Joni Ernst of Iowa for policy chair and electing Steve Daines of Montana to replace Mr. Scott as NRSC chairman.