Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) rekindled his feud with Mitch McConnell (R-KY) on Tuesday with an op-ed accusing the Senate minority leader of “undermining” the Republican Party with a border compromise that has been panned by conservatives.
Scott, who unsuccessfully challenged McConnell for his leadership role last February and has been a thorn in his side ever since, criticized the Senate GOP leader in an editorial for the Hill over his support for the proposed border deal, which would be paired with funding for Ukraine.
McConnell, Ukraine’s staunchest GOP ally since Russia launched its war, has said he supports the supplemental as long as it includes “credible” border policy changes. That has put him at odds, however, with former President Donald Trump, who has come out against the border deal.
“Trump and House and Senate conservatives represent the views and beliefs of Republican voters,” Scott wrote. “Mitch McConnell and the Washington establishment don’t. They have undermined Republican voters for years, and the voters have said enough.”
“If you want someone to blame for a failure to get something done to secure the border, or provide lethal aid to Ukraine, Israel or Taiwan, blame Washington’s Senate Republican leader, who is totally disconnected with our voters and who would rather pass anything for Ukraine than actually secure our border,” he continued.
A bipartisan working group of senators has been negotiating since the fall on a border security deal that would unlock Ukraine funding but also assistance for Israel and Taiwan. Negotiators on both sides have acknowledged that the border measure is critical to passing the legislation through both chambers.
McConnell has already faced multiple efforts by Ukraine skeptics in his conference to push a stand-alone Israel aid bill through the chamber that was repeatedly blocked. He also, however, voted down Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer‘s (D-NY) efforts to move forward on the defense bill because negotiators had failed to reach a deal on the border measure.
While more than half of the 49 GOP senators support some type of continued aid to Ukraine, there is a vocal part of the conference that strongly opposes the funding. There is also an influence campaign by Trump, who is publicly urging GOP lawmakers to oppose the deal over what he views as insufficient border security measures.
Scott sided with Trump in the op-ed, channeling the general conservative distrust Republican lawmakers have with the Biden administration on the matter of border enforcement.
“Securing the border requires forcing Biden to enforce the law. Nothing we have seen over the past three years suggests he will do that,” he wrote. “That’s why McConnell’s plan to give Biden and Democrats a win that they can campaign on and claim they’re working to solve the border crisis is a joke.”
Scott rejected the notion in an interview over the weekend that conservatives like himself were coming out against the supplemental because of Trump’s opposition.
“He’s irrelevant to this conversation. He’s not in office,” Scott told Fox News Sunday of Trump.
In his Tuesday op-ed, however, he repeatedly pointed to the former president’s record on border security as a reason for his inclusion in any potential border deal.
“Why would anyone in Washington believe that Trump, the Republican majority in the House of Representatives and Senate conservatives should be totally cast out of the conversation about the alleged border bill?” he asked.
A McConnell spokesperson couldn’t be reached by the Washington Examiner for comment on the op-ed.
Scott and McConnell’s feud has played out in public terms for nearly three years. The two sparred repeatedly when Scott served as National Republican Senatorial Committee chairman for the 2022 cycle, with each holding opposing views on how to win back control of the upper chamber.
After Republicans underperformed expectations — Democrats gained a seat and thus an outright 51-49 majority — Scott launched a bid for McConnell’s job as party leader. He lost that challenge in a 37-10 vote that reaffirmed McConnell as the top Republican.
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The loss has not deterred Scott from criticizing the minority leader, whom he described in his Tuesday op-ed as one of the politicians who “represent a Republican Party that exists only in Washington, where it’s dominated by political and economic insiders.”
“In this world, yesterday’s insider Republicans cut secret deals with yesterday’s insider Democrats behind closed doors, then spring them on hard working Americans like they just did us a great favor, when they actually kicked us in the teeth,” he said. “That’s over. Yesterday’s Republicans have cut enough self-serving deals with today’s Democrats. It’s time to move ahead without them.”