10.01.20

McConnell on Fox News Channel’s ‘Special Report with Bret Baier’

WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) joined Bret Baier on Fox News Channel’s ‘Special Report with Bret Baier’ tonight. See below for highlights or click here to watch the full interview.

On Democrats Blocking COVID-19 Relief Legislation:

“I've been trying to get an outcome here for quite a while. As you may recall a few weeks ago I put a rescue package on the floor of the Senate targeting kids, jobs, health care and liability protection. And at that point, we couldn't get a single Democrat to vote for it. So I think what's happened here is as we've gotten closer to the election, the spirit of bipartisanship on coronavirus that we had in March and April has largely disappeared.

…

“What I put on the Senate floor three weeks ago was about a half a trillion dollars, narrowly targeted at exactly what the economy needs at this point. What the Speaker did, even after coming down a full trillion dollars, is throw everything you can imagine into the package, including tax cuts for rich people in California and New York, and free health care for illegal immigrants. That sort of thing is not appropriate.”

On Judge Barrett’s Nomination:

“The American people I think really need an opportunity to get to meet and know Judge Barrett. And that will happen during the Judiciary Committee hearings. We were calling each other hypocrites before. What we need to see is the nominee. We’ll have an opportunity to do that over the next few weeks.

“She’s spectacular. An incredible life story, wonderful family, five kids, two adopted kids, one special needs kid. And one of her professors at Notre Dame wrote an op-ed in "The Washington Post" recently saying she was the single most brilliant student he'd ever had in all of his years teaching law at Notre Dame.”

On Voting on the Nomination This Year:

 “Well, this Republican Senate was elected for a term that ends in January of next year. The President was elected for a four-year term that ends January 20th of next year. There are no reduced constitutional prerogatives that during either of our tenures-- and in fact, you'll remember, two years ago when my party actually gained two seats in the Senate while we were losing the House, the biggest issue in the campaign was a Supreme Court nominee, Brett Kavanaugh.”