Goodbye and Good Riddance to Mitch McConnell

Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell announced Wednesday that he is stepping down as GOP leader this November. The Kentucky Republican is the longest-serving Senate leader, and has served in Republican Senate leadership for nearly two decades.

McConnell, who is now 82 years old, will be leaving the post after a series of episodes last year where he seemed to freeze and shut down entirely in front of the press. The news comes as a wave of longtime members of Congress (especially Republicans) are also announcing their retirements, many of them exhausted by the infighting in recent years. McConnell will serve the remainder of his Senate term, which ends in 2027.

“I think back to my first days in the Senate with deep appreciation for the time that helped shape my view of the world,” McConnell said on the Senate floor Wednesday. “I’m unconflicted about the good within our country and the irreplaceable role we play as the leader of the free world.”

“Believe me, I know the politics within my party at this particular moment in time. I have many faults. Misunderstanding politics is not one of them.”

“One of life’s most underappreciated talents is to know when it’s time to move on to life’s next chapter,” McConnell concluded. “So I stand before you today...to say that this will be my last term as Republican leader of the Senate. I’m not going anywhere anytime soon. However, I’ll complete my job my colleagues have given me until we select a new leader in November and they take the helm next January.”

Republican senators were shocked by McConnell’s announcement, reportedly not having been informed of his resignation beforehand.

As Senate leader, McConnell had two main objectives in the role. First, he wanted to completely block campaign finance reform. Second, he wanted to stack the courts with conservative reactionaries.

McConnell’s main goal as Senate leader seemed to be to encourage more money in politics, welcoming the role of corporate America in U.S. democracy. It’s impossible to go through the full history of how he has blocked campaign finance reform efforts over his nearly 20 years in leadership, but he has opposed any real change at virtually every turn.

A big reason for his decades-long fight with former Senator John McCain, for example, was over McCain’s signature campaign finance law.

In 2002, the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act, commonly known as the McCain-Feingold Act, aimed to limit the role of “soft money” in political campaigns as well as the political advertising of corporations and nonprofit organizations in elections. Almost immediately after it became law, McConnnell took the law to court, challenging its constitutionality. By 2010, the Supreme Court weighed in with Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, overturning key aspects of the law and effectively freeing corporations to spend money directly advocating for the election or defeat of specific candidates.

This was a recurring theme for McConnell during his leadership. More recently, in 2021, he helped kill Democrats’ sweeping voting rights and election overhaul bill, which would have required additional disclosures on funding and stiffened campaign law enforcement. McConnell at the time called the bill, which would have also expanded voter registration and vote by mail options, “jaw-droppingly audacious.”

On the courts, McConnell was just as cruel in his leadership.

He single-handedly held up the appointment of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court during President Barack Obama’s tenure—arguing that the president couldn’t appoint a Supreme Court justice in an election year. But when it came to President Donald Trump’s term, McConnell suddenly sang a very different tune.

He helped Trump appoint three Supreme Court justices, including Amy Coney Barrett in 2020. That Supreme Court, of course, overturned Roe v. Wade and repealed the right to abortion just two years later.

And it wasn’t only the Supreme Court. McConnell helped Trump completely reshape our judiciary, allowing Trump to appoint 54 appeals court judges during his 4-year tenure. For comparison, President Barack Obama appointed only 55 appeals court judges over his eight years in the White House. The court of appeals, it’s critical to note, handles tens of thousands of cases annually and is reshaping laws in ways that don’t get nearly as much attention as what the Supreme Court is doing.

All this to say, McConnell did nothing good for this country as Senate leader. He used his position in power to help only himself and his party.

This story has been updated.

House Oversight Chair James Comer is finally laying down his cards. Republicans’ Biden corruption impeachment crusade is over, at least for now.

“I am ready to try to begin to close this investigation,” Comer told reporters in the Capitol Wednesday. “This has been a very difficult investigation. This administration has been very obstructive. They haven’t been cooperative, [feels] like we are having to battle the Department of Justice and the FBI on a daily basis to get basic information.”

“Many of our witnesses that we brought in would be what I consider hostile witnesses, but at the end of the day I think with every interview we’ve learned new information and the basis of what we’ve learned is that the Bidens didn’t have a legitimate business,” he said.

It’s an amazing and last-minute reversal by one of the main House Republicans spearheading the entire Biden impeachment quest. In fact, embattled first son Hunter Biden testified in a closed-door hearing on Wednesday as part of the GOP’s investigation. But what should have been a major win for Republicans instead was accompanied by Comer’s admission of loss.

The sign of defeat comes as two major developments have essentially doomed Republicans’ impeachment efforts.

First, earlier this month, Republicans lost their key witness, Alexander Smirnov, who made up the very foundation of the GOP’s corruption claims about the president. Republicans had for months pointed to an FBI informant who in 2020 reported that President Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden received $5 million each in bribes from a Ukrainian oligarch, thanks to Hunter Biden’s businesses. That claim, while unverified by the FBI, was the main piece of evidence Republicans pointed to in their impeachment quest. Republicans last year went so far as to publicly release the FBI’s report, over the agency’s objections.

But two weeks ago, Smirnov was indicted for lying to the FBI and essentially making up the whole thing. As if that wasn’t bad enough, upon arrest, the Justice Department reported that Smirnov confessed to law enforcement that the story actually came from Russian intelligence officers.

Republicans have been desperate to pretend that losing Smirnov wasn’t a big issue, but Comer’s admission on Wednesday seals the deal.

The other big problem, which Comer surely realizes, is that Republicans now have an even narrower majority in the House. Representative-elect Tom Suozzi will be sworn in on Wednesday, taking over George Santos’s House seat. House Republicans will soon hold a majority of just 219–213, with three vacancies in the chamber. As a reminder, they rushed through the impeachment of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas with just one vote, hours before Suozzi was elected.

The numbers are no longer in Republicans’ favor, and the evidence definitely isn’t, either. Finally, Comer is waking up to that reality.

Republican Representative Lauren Boebert accused President Joe Biden of running a “crime family”—while just a couple hours before, her 18-year-old son was arrested in connection with a crime wave in Colorado.

Tyler Jay Boebert is facing 22 charges over “a recent string of vehicle trespass and property thefts” in Rifle, a town in Colorado’s 3rd congressional district, which his mom currently represents, said police.

The teen faces “four felony counts of Criminal Possession ID Documents—Multiple Victims, one felony count of Conspiracy to Commit a Felony, and over 15 additional misdemeanor and petty offenses,” according to the Rifle Police Department.

On the Garfield County Sheriff’s Office website Wednesday morning, Tyler Boebert was listed as a current inmate at Garfield County Jail.

To be clear, the criminal justice system in this country is not a joke—and neither is dragging politicians’ family members (let alone teenage kids) into the news cycle. But the irony is a bit startling given Representative Boebert’s own post on crime families Tuesday afternoon.

According to the Rifle Police Department, Tyler Boebert was arrested at around 2:30 p.m. on Tuesday. At 4:35 p.m., his mom took to social media to warn about the “Biden crime family.”

House Republicans including Lauren Boebert have been leading a fruitless crusade to impeach President Joe Biden while exposing his family’s corruption. But so far, their efforts have revealed no real evidence.

Just this month, their star witness, Alexander Smirnov, was indicted for lying to the FBI about claims that Joe Biden and Hunter Biden both received bribes from a Ukrainian oligarch. According to the Justice Department, upon arrest, Smironv admitted to law enforcement that the story came from Russian intelligence offices.

You know Republicans are in troubled waters when even Fox News has abandoned ship.

On Tuesday, a Fox host highlighted that Hunter Biden’s closed-door deposition would prove a critical juncture for a monthslong probe that has amounted to, basically, nothing.

“So this is coming at a critical moment for the Republicans’ impeachment inquiry,” said Steve Doocy on Fox & Friends. “And on Capitol Hill, a lot of Republican lawmakers say they have seen zero evidence of high crimes and misdemeanors. And right now, the Republicans do not have enough votes to impeach. And after dozens of interviews and over 100,000 documents released to the committees, the Republicans have yet to produce any direct evidence of misconduct by Joe Biden.”

But the other anchors behind the desk couldn’t quite leave it at that. Instead, they offered their own spin on a probe that recently crumbled after its key witness, FBI informant Alexander Smirnov—whose self-admitted lies served as the primary foundation for claims that Biden pocketed millions in bribes from a Ukrainian oligarch—was indicted by the Department of Justice for making it all up with the help of top Russian intelligence officials.

“But man, this looks absolutely terrible, 150 suspicious activity reports around them,” Brian Kilmeade objected. “Joe Biden was in on meetings with every major deal regarding Hunter Biden. He said my dad is sitting next to me while talking to a Chinese CFC official.”

That led to a bit of sparring between the two, with Doocy doubling down that Republicans had come up with nothing—and yet again on the eve of a looming government shutdown.

“I think there are many lawmakers who say they’ve seen zero evidence of high crimes and misdemeanors,” Doocy repeated.

“But we just said that they have,” Kilmeade replied.

“But they’ve … to impeach somebody you need direct evidence of misconduct by Joe Biden,” Doocy said, flustered. “Look, Hunter Biden, it sure looks like he traded on his name and he’s going to have plenty of time today—”

Kilmeade then interjected, adding that “the role his dad played is key.”

“Some Republicans say they’ve got the goods on Hunter Biden and Joe Biden. But a number of Republicans who I’ve spoken to on Capitol Hill say there’s no direct evidence of misconduct by the current president,” Doocy continued.

Even before the president’s son, once the GOP’s most sought-after witness, took the stand on Wednesday morning, House Republicans were already hyping their next witness, special counsel Robert Hur. His invitation—just weeks after Hur issued a damning report on Biden’s health—could prove to add yet another dimension to the seemingly endless impeachment probe.

CNN’s Anderson Cooper tried to cut off a guest panelist speaking about Israel’s atrocities in Gaza, during a segment on the number of  “uncommitted” votes in Michigan’s presidential primary.

Former Ohio state Senator Nina Turner was reacting to the early results Tuesday evening, which had already revealed a high number of votes for “uncommitted,” thanks to a protest campaign over President Biden’s horrific backing of Israel’s war on Gaza.

“I am young enough to remember, colleagues, when Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib and also Congresswoman Cori Bush called for a cease-fire very early on, they were called abhorrent,” said Turner, who’s been a vocal supporter of the “uncommitted” vote protest campaign. “And now fast-forward to all of these bodies laying in the wake, and people are living through this every single day.”

“By the way, there’s also been slaughter in Israel,” Cooper interrupted, as other panelists also tried to jump in. 

“So there’s a lot of pain on both sides,” Cooper continued, questioning why Turner was giving a “lecture on the problem.”

“I’m talking about the politics of this tonight,” he stated. “What, to you, would be a victory, as someone who was calling for this ‘uncommitted’ vote?”

“I’m not denying that pain,” Turner responded. “All I’m saying is that at a certain point after October 7, it becomes clear. I mean, you have a right-wing prime minister.” 

“Right. We don’t need to debate the issue,” Cooper interrupted again.

The whole exchange is mind-boggling and worth watching in full to see just how much Cooper and other CNN panelists seem to be missing the point.

More than 100,000 Democratic voters in Michigan’s primary election Tuesday chose to show up to the polls and check the “uncommitted” box rather than vote for Biden. That’s about 13 percent of voters, or one in seven people.

The reason for that protest vote is clear: Organizers of the “Listen to Michigan” and “Abandon Biden” campaigns spent weeks reaching out to Democratic voters, urging them to make their voice known—and help send a wake-up call to Biden on his support for Israel’s atrocities in Gaza.

So despite what Cooper said Tuesday evening, it is actually critical to talk about Gaza in any analysis of Michigan’s results. Talking about Israel’s bombing of Gaza—and how Biden is backing that bombing—is the actual politics of the issue.

“I think sometimes as we’re talking about this issue, we are centering President Biden, we are centering former President Donald Trump, when the ‘uncommitted’ effort is the center, the people closest to the pain, and that is the Arab American community, that is the Palestinian community, that is communities that care about peace,” Turner said on CNN Tuesday evening.

“And so while this president was in the ice cream shop saying, ‘I think there’s going to be a ceasefire,’ 30,000 people have been slaughtered. People are living in famine. They can’t get medical care. So it can’t come soon enough for them, and that was really the weight that I picked up on when I was in Dearborn, [Michigan].”