Mitch McConnell fuming at Trump for sticking him with 'unelectable' candidates: NYT reporter

Appearing on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" on Friday, the New York Times' Peter Baker claimed that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) is highly displeased that his chance of becoming Senate Majority Leader after the 2022 midterm election is spiraling down the drain due to a slate of terrible GOP candidates who were hand-picked by Donald Trump.

The day after McConnell was accused by some members of his caucus of being "played" by Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV), host Willie Geist asked Baker how McConnell is feeling after new polling shows Trump candidates Mehmet Oz in Pennsylvania and Herschel Walker in Georgia are both losing badly to their respective Democratic opponents and Ohio's J.D. Vance is struggling.

After being asked, if you're McConnell, "What are you thinking?" Baker said the Senate minority leader is thinking, "I told you so."

"Mitch McConnell has been through this before, that have been through a cycle where the Republican Party picked a number of candidates in various hot races that were unelectable and now he's worried that they're repeating history," Baker explained.

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"And that of course, in his mind this is Donald Trump's fault, right?" he continued. "He has said all along that the party needs to move on from Donald Trump, needs to not be a hostage to Trump but he hasn't been willing to confront him in a direct way, since the impeachment trial of last year."

That's a consequence you're seeing through these primaries and candidate selection processes," he added. "Georgia, Pennsylvania, Ohio, these ought to be Republican states in an environment like this, with inflation being what it is, with the economy either in, or certainly near, a recession. Those ought to be pick-ups are at least holds for Republicans who have two of those states and he ought to get his 52 seat majority back as far as Mitch McConnell is concerned and they might not because of who they picked to run for them."

"Obviously, the opposite in, I think, the House, Republicans still doing well," he elaborated. "[House Minority Leader] Kevin McCarthy is still favored to win the majority there although the odds have narrowed a little, Democrats doing a little better. But it says something about the Republican Party if they're not able to take one if not both houses in an environment as as tough as this is. President Biden's numbers are in the tank, down as low as they are in the 30's. The president's party is facing economic headwinds, the way that they are, if they're not losing in the midterms that is really something about the opposition party."

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MSNBC 07 29 2022 07 14 19youtu.be