Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said in an interview last year that he hoped former President Trump would “pay the price” for his role in the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. It was reported that he said that AxiosI acquired an early copy of the book by journalist Michael Tackett.
“If he hasn't committed an indictable crime, I don't know what is,” McConnell said weeks after special counsel Jack Smith filed an election-subversion case against the former president, according to Axios. '' he told Tackett.
The interview was conducted a week before Election Day for Tackett's upcoming book, The Price of Power, due out later this month.
“There's no question who was the inspiration. I think he's going to have to pay the price,” McConnell said, referring to President Trump and the events at the Capitol on January 6, Axios reported. I just hope it doesn't happen,” he told Tackett.
“From the beginning, McConnell believed there was merit in the charges brought against Trump by federal prosecutors,” Tackett wrote in his book, according to Axios, recalling an interview with the Republican Party's longest-serving leader. He is reported to have written, “
Tackett reported on the extent to which McConnell considered voting to convict Trump in the Senate when he was impeached by the Democratic-led House of Representatives after the attack on the Capitol. Conviction would have required a two-thirds vote in the House, but even with the support of seven Republican senators and all Democrats, that effort fell short.
According to Axios, Tackett reported on an oral history interview McConnell gave a week after the Capitol attack, in which McConnell said he was “completely inconsistent as to whether the president's conduct constituted an impeachable offense.” “No,” he said, adding, “I think so.” teeth. “
Axios cited an oral history interview in which McConnell added that encouraging an insurrection by those who stormed the Capitol was “as close to an impeachable crime as you can imagine.”
However, McConnell ultimately voted against convicting the former president, saying Trump was no longer president and could be held accountable through the criminal justice system or civil lawsuits, Axios reported. . He endorsed Trump's presidential reelection bid in March.
“Nothing I say about President Trump pales in comparison to what people like J.D. Vance and Lindsey Graham have said about him, but now… We're all on the same team.”
