Deriding the “Green New Deal” and “Medicare for All,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell vowed to be Congress’ “grim reaper” and thwart all progressive proposals on the Senate floor.
“If I’m still the majority leader of the Senate after next year, none of those things are going to pass the Senate,” the Kentucky Republican told a small crowd during an event in his home state Monday. “They won’t even be voted on. So think of me as the grim reaper: the guy who is going to make sure that socialism doesn’t land on the president’s desk.”
Before referring to himself as the personification of death, McConnell, the White House’s most powerful ally on Capitol Hill, accused Democrats in Congress and those running for president of endorsing a fringe, far-left agenda that will imperil the American economy.
“You pass the Green New Deal and Medicare for All, you have fundamentally changed this country, fundamentally changed it into an unproductive place with significant unemployment and huge problems,” McConnell said, noting that some of his colleagues in the Senate who are running for president, like Sens. Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, Kamala Harris and Cory Booker, have vouched their support for both proposals.
McConnell said progressive platforms are being touted by most mainstream Democrats, not just “some young woman from New York who just got elected to Congress,” presumably referring to freshman Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who represents parts of Queens and the Bronx.
“It’s much broader than that,” McConnell said.
Alan He contributed to this report.
