McConnell prevailed over Ukraine funding and took political blows

Sen. Mitch McConnell risked his position by aggressively pursuing military aid to Ukraine despite deep Republican opposition, and he achieved the desired result: a strong vote in the Senate to strengthen embattled U.S. allies at a critical time.

“History pays all bills,” McConnell, Republican of Kentucky and minority leader, said in a statement issued early Tuesday, minutes after the Senate voted 70-29 in favor of a $95 billion foreign aid package. “And today, when it comes to the value of American leadership and strength, history will show that the Senate did not blink.”

But his hard-fought legislative victory came at a cost.

The bitter battle in the Senate over the aid package — money that Mr. McConnell saw as essential to maintaining Western power — exposed serious divisions among Senate Republicans, not just over Ukraine and border security policy, but also over his leadership.

The fallout underscored McConnell's declining influence over his party's base and raised new questions about his future. Although most of his leading critics had spoken out against him in the past, their complaints took on a bold new intensity when they openly called for his ouster, claiming that he was out of step with the majority of his colleagues, as evidenced by the fact that most Republicans were against the bill.

“It stinks to high heaven,” Sen. J.D. Vance, a freshman Republican from Ohio, said on the Senate floor Monday. “No one who has seen this process believe that Republican leadership negotiated border security in good faith, or that Democrats did the same. It was always Kabuki theater.”

But Mr. McConnell, a traditional Reaganite foreign policy interventionist, was determined to secure more money for Ukraine even as it put him on a collision course with many of his Republican members and former President Donald J. Trump, the likely candidate for the party in 2024.

In speech after speech ahead of the vote, Mr McConnell was adamant that the United States had no choice but to continue supplying Ukraine to hold off the Russian invasion, with his calls increasingly aimed at naysayers as the debate in the Senate became more intense.

“In this chamber, we must face the world as it is,” McConnell said Sunday in advocating for the legislation. “We must reject the vaguest and most short-sighted views of our obligations and instead grapple with real problems.”

He was so fixated on securing the Ukrainian money that he reluctantly agreed to conservative demands that approval be tied to Congress enacting new restrictions on the southern border, a link he acknowledged would be challenging to to achieve this. It turns out he was right. After his staff engaged in lengthy negotiations to hammer out a new border measure, those same conservatives quickly rejected it, and Mr. McConnell ultimately voted against what was essentially his bill.

The Senate then decided to consider the $60 billion in aid to Ukraine, along with aid to Israel and its Pacific allies, removing border provisions. Mr. McConnell voted repeatedly to overcome Republican filibusters. Despite the victory in the Senate, the prospects for the legislation in the House of Representatives were highly uncertain, given resistance from far-right Republicans who have branded Mr. McConnell as a “uniparty” globalist leader.

Republican critics said Mr. McConnell's problem was that he had more in common with Democrats led by Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the majority leader, on the border and Ukraine policy than with his fellow Republicans. They said he undermined the party's political cause by giving Democrats cover for their failure to secure the border.

“The Republican leadership strategy has been a disaster in this immigration deal from the beginning,” said Senator Ted Cruz, Republican of Texas. He added that Mr. McConnell “repeated word for word the talking points of Chuck Schumer and the Democrats.”

It was a dynamic Mr. Schumer who was recently captured at a media dinner at a black-tie convention, joking about his alliance with Mr. McConnell belting out a Jay-Z lyric.

“You could say I have 99 problems, but Mitch isn't one,” Mr. Schumer joked.

Other Republicans backed Mr. McConnell, saying he was carrying out the policy out of principle and a desire to protect America's place in the world, despite angry conservative backlash.

“Nobody here can blame Mitch,” said Senator Thom Tillis, Republican of North Carolina and a supporter of the bill. “I fully support him.”

“It's not a Mitch problem,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican who opposed the legislation. “It's just the way the system works. There is division over Ukraine.”

Mr. McConnell has been under fire before, facing a leadership challenge last year that he easily shrugged off. But members of the growing contingent of more hawkish, MAGA-aligned Senate Republicans have been uncompromising in their assessment of his handling of the border and Ukrainian fighting, saying he was too focused on saving Ukraine and not enough on the needs at home .

“This has been such an absolute debacle,” said Sen. Josh Hawley, Republican of Missouri.

“His problem is that he doesn't talk to his members; he doesn't listen to his members,” Mr. Hawley recently told reporters. “Is it any wonder that Republicans are taking action?”

Senator Rand Paul, McConnell's Republican colleague in his home state and a frequent critic, was caustic in his assessment of the minority leader as he attacked the foreign aid package.

“The leadership in the Republican Party is really not much,” Mr. Paul said. He addressed one of Mr. McConnell's main arguments in support of financing Ukraine: that much of the federal money ultimately finds its way to American companies that produce weapons and ammunition. “I find it really disturbing that there are people on both sides of the aisle arguing, 'No problem, it helps our defense industrial base.'”

Mr. McConnell achieved a personal goal of becoming the Senate's longest-serving leader in January 2023, as he began his 17th year as the top Republican. But it has been a difficult period since then for Mr McConnell, who suffered a serious fall in March and suffered a series of very public health episodes that raised questions about whether he could continue in office.

Mr. McConnell, who turns 82 next week, has said he plans to serve out his Senate term, which ends in early 2027. But he was less definitive about whether he will run again after the November election.

Senators close to Mr. McConnell say they believe he would jump at the chance to return as majority leader for the last time if Republicans can retake the Senate. But in recent weeks we have shown how difficult it would be to remain leader if Trump – a vicious enemy of his – were aligned in the White House with an aggressively anti-McConnell MAGA faction in the Senate.

“I don't know what he would want to do,” Senator Kevin Cramer, Republican of North Dakota, said of Mr. McConnell's future as leader. “What I can't imagine is why he would want to run again.”