McConnell in Covington: “We Don’t Do Anything” in Senate, But That Would Change

“We don’t do anything,” Republican Senator Mitch McConnell said of the United States Senate while speaking before the Northern Kentucky Chamber of Commerce on Thursday. But that would change if the 30-year veteran of Congress’s upper chamber is reelected on Tuesday and later made Senate Majority Leader, he said. 

“The President felt he got all the legislation he needed in his first two years,” McConnell said. “(Senate Majority Leader) Harry Reid (D-NV)’s job has been to make sure (President Obama) is not interrupted.” So, the Senate has not been very productive since 2010. McConnell believes that if the Republican Party can take control of the Senate, elevating him from Minority Leader to Majority Leader, a truly divided government would work more effectively with the President. The Republicans already control the US House of Representatives.

But first, McConnell must fend off a feisty challenge from Democratic Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes. Polls have shown the two running neck and neck in recent weeks and Grimes has been circling the state with President Bill Clinton and former First Lady, US Senator, and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton who will appear with Grimes at Northern Kentucky University on Saturday.

Both Grimes and McConnell have made several appearances in the Republican stronghold of Northern Kentucky with Grimes saying she expects to surprise people with the results out of this region. McConnell, meanwhile, said Thursday that he welcomes the Clintons to Kentucky because it tends to be good news for him. In 1996, President Clinton was reelected, carrying Kentucky by 13,000 votes. That same year,  McConnell trounced Democrat Steve Beshear (the current governor) by a margin of 55 – 44%. “In my line of work that’s a pretty good thumpin’,” McConnell said. 

A poll released Thursday evening has McConnell leading Grimes 48 – 43%.

If McConnell is returned to Washington for a sixth six-year term, and his Party has control of the Senate, he would send bills “the president doesn’t like” to the White House, namely ones that would scale back regulations on the coal industry, he said. 

The veteran lawmaker acknowledged the toughness of the 2014 election. Two elections ago, he carried 113 of 120 counties. In 2008, Democrat Bruce Lunsford carried 31 counties against McConnell, but lost by 5%. This time may be even closer. The Minority Leader said that Grimes has a lot of money because of people that don’t like him, but that he’s got a lot of money, too. “You could say I’m funding both sides,” he joked.

In recent weeks, Grimes has hammered McConnell on what she says is the senator’s desire to privatize Social Security, an allegation that makes McConnell “want to gag”. “Nobody wants to privatize Social Security. I certainly do not,” he said. McConnell also said that he opposes tolls as a financing method for the estimated $2.6 billion Brent Spence Bridge project, another issue that Grimes has hammered him on during visits and ads targeted to Northern Kentucky.

Though Grimes expects to surprise people with the Northern Kentucky results on Tuesday, McConnell is confident that the region will come through for him. “Northern Kentucky has been solidly Republican and increasingly that way over thirty-five, forty years,” he said.

Written by Michael Monks, editor & publisher of The River City News

Photo: Mitch McConnell greets Chamber members after Thursday’s lunch at the Metropolitan Club in Covington/RCN