Exactly which Senate does he think he's leading?
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, standing next to what can only be described as aspirational signs about "restoring the Senate" and getting it "back to work," gave a press conference Thursday to say that Republicans
should not shut down government over Planned Parenthood defunding.
In a wide-ranging news conference with reporters Thursday, McConnell warned of the consequences for Republicans if the party triggers a government shutdown over a controversial policy dispute, like the GOP did with Obamacare in 2013.
“We’ve been down this path before,” he said. “This is a tactic that’s been tried going back to the ’90s, frequently by Republican majorities that always have the same ending: that the focus is on the fact that the government is shut down, not on what the underlying issue that is being protested is.”
The stance from the Senate’s most powerful member is sure to irk conservatives—including Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), a chief McConnell foil—who have threatened to use any means possible to strip funding from Planned Parenthood. The group is under fire after multiple videos showed Planned Parenthood officials discussing the alleged improper sale of fetal organs and tissues.
At this point even Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) is clamoring for a shutdown fight over Planned Parenthood, so McConnell is severely underestimating how hard it's going to be to keep his right flank under control, as usual. What's more, public pronouncements like this are only fuel to Ted Cruz's fire. Though maybe that's McConnell's strategy: get Cruz so worked up that he'll do something so outrageous that he's even further isolated within the Republican conference. Even so, McConnell can't make promises for House Speaker John Boehner. The fight he's in with Cruz will likely only make Boehner's problem children more committed to another kamikaze shutdown mission.