A version of this story appeared in CNN’s What Matters newsletter. To get it in your inbox, sign up for free here.
On the heels of the general election last week, there’s another important vote on tap this Wednesday in Washington that will greatly impact what President-elect Donald Trump can accomplish during his four years in office: Republicans in the Senate will vote by secret ballot to choose a new leader.
Trump will also be in Washington, meeting in the morning with House Republicans and then traveling to the White House to meet with President Joe Biden.
Come January, Republicans will control the Senate. While Trump has not endorsed a candidate in the Senate leadership race, he has called on senators to cede him some power and commit to allowing him to appoint Cabinet secretaries in recess appointments – a way for presidents to essentially bypass Congress that is a break from recent practice.
Trump’s most vocal supporters are organizing behind Florida Sen. Rick Scott, a controversial figure who is still viewed as the long-shot option. The more establishment options are Sen. John Thune of South Dakota and Sen. John Cornyn of Texas. The rare leadership battle is unique for senators, since it is playing out not just behind closed doors in the Capitol but also in public on conservative media.
Ultimately, the question for Republican lawmakers is whether they want to pick a leader who has years of experience in the arcane practices of the Senate or a leader who was early to tap into the MAGA movement.
End of the McConnell era
Sen. Mitch McConnell, 82, is the longest-serving Senate party leader in US history, having been the top Republican in the chamber since the tail end of the George W. Bush administration.
History may remember him most for engineering a conservative majority on the US Supreme Court, refusing to allow then-President Barack Obama’s nominee to get a vote with a delay in 2016 and then quickly ramming through a nominee, Trump’s third, one week before Trump lost the 2020 election.
McConnell will stay in the chamber until his term ends in 2026 but has cleared the way for a new generation of leaders to deal with Trump. McConnell has admitted that his brand of Republicanism seems out of place in Trump’s populist version of the party.
In pictures: Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell
Trump and McConnell tangled frequently, especially after the storming of the Capitol on January 6, 2021. McConnell did not ultimately vote to convict Trump during an impeachment trial, but he did say Trump was “disgraceful.” Trump went on to criticize McConnell and use racist language to describe McConnell’s wife, Elaine Chao, who served as Transportation secretary in Trump’s first Cabinet.
The duality of McConnell is that he has both criticized Trump – he told a recent biographer Trump was a “sleazeball” and that the MAGA movement is wrong – and also capitalized on Trump’s ascent, helped protect Trump as president in his first term and ultimately backed his run for the White House this year. “We are all on the same team now,” he said.
McConnell will also be remembered for how the Senate changed during his leadership, when use of the filibuster exploded and was employed to blockade the opposing party. Multiple Democrats endorsed nuking the filibuster during Biden’s administration, given their slim Senate majority. Come January, they will rely on it to block Trump’s agenda.
After Trump’s victory last week, McConnell said he was confident that the filibuster would be in safe hands with a Republican majority.
A big decision for Republican senators
Senate Republicans could move in wildly different directions, depending on who replaces McConnell.
Thune is McConnell’s No. 2, the Republican whip, and Cornyn previously held that role. Both were first elected to the Senate during the Bush administration and have spent decades as senators. Both have at times been critical of Trump, who once called on Republicans in South Dakota to launch a primary challenge against Thune.
Having lived through periods in the majority and the minority, both Thune and Cornyn might be unwilling to drastically change the status quo in the Senate.
Scott, on the other hand, wants drastic change.
“We have got to change the way the Senate is run to get Trump’s agenda done,” he said on Fox News.
While it’s ultimately Republican senators voting in secret who will choose their leader, Scott has tried to mobilize Trump’s followers to make the leadership race part of the Trump movement.
“Right now, it’s really just the Washington establishment versus the Republicans that want to elect Trump,” Scott told the right-wing provocateur Laura Loomer on her podcast.
Thune seemed to reject the establishment vs. insurgent view in an opinion piece for Fox News, arguing that Republicans would have to set aside differences to deliver on Trump’s agenda in the face of what will surely be unified opposition from Democrats.
“If we don’t successfully execute on our mandate, we risk losing the coalition that swept Republicans into office up and down the ballot,” Thune wrote.
Cornyn is taking a very different approach.
“I’m not going to do this in the press,” he told CNN’s Lauren Fox.
But the candidates have been laying groundwork for months. CNN’s Capitol Hill team noted last week that Thune and Cornyn worked hard during the campaign season to help GOP colleagues. Cornyn appeared next to Trump during Trump’s trips to Texas, and Thune met with Trump at Mar-a-Lago in Florida.
Scott only got 10 votes when he ran against McConnell in 2022 even though he had the backing of Trump back then. Thune and Cornyn, on the other hand, have been waiting in line for years.
