In an unexpected turn, Senator Mitch McConnell, the Senate minority leader, announced his unrestricted support for former President Donald Trump, leaving behind the hostility between the Republican leaders in recent years.
"It is abundantly clear that former President Trump has earned the requisite support of Republican voters to be our nominee for President of the United States," McConnell said in a statement Wednesday. "It should come as no surprise that as nominee, he will have my support."
Trump responded to the endorsement in a post on his Truth social media, promising to work with the minority leader to regain control of the Senate.
The complex relationship between McConnell and Trump
The sudden announcement surprised many because, if there has been any criticism of McConnell from 2021 onwards, it has been former President Trump, who, in recent years, has not stopped attacking the veteran Republican senator.
In February 2021, a month after the January 6 events at the Capitol, Trump attacked McConnell in a fierce statement, calling the senator a graceless politician.
"Mitch is a dour, sullen, and unsmiling political hack, and if Republican Senators are going to stay with him, they will not win again," Trump said on that occasion.
This statement was published after McConnell said on the Senate floor that Trump was morally responsible for the storming of the Capitol, in a scathing criticism of the former president at a delicate political moment.
However, McConnell himself refused to vote in favor of Trump's impeachment.
Over the years, the relationship between McConnell and Trump became even more acrimonious and hostile. In fact, since December 2020, neither of them has spoken directly.
According to various reports, both communicate through two trusted intermediaries: Chris LaCivita, from the Trump campaign, and Josh Holmes, a McConnell confidant.
These allies of Trump and McConnell have discussed for months the approach that the Republican Party should take in the face of the 2024 general elections, where not only the White House but also the recovery of Congress by the GOP will be at stake.
And Trump has not stopped attacking McConnell in recent years with insults, mockery and strong attacks that have grabbed headlines in the country's leading media outlets.
In April 2021, according to a Politico report, Trump lashed out at McConnell before a Republican National Committee donor retreat, calling him a "dumb son of a bitch."
In July 2022, on his Truth social media, the former president published a survey that indicated McConnell as the most unpopular member of the United States Senate. Trump took credit for that study.
That same year, in November, Trump called McConnell a loser after the senator berated the former president for meeting with Nick Fuentes and Kanye West.
"There is no room in the Republican Party for antisemitism or white supremacy. And anyone meeting with people advocating that point of view, in my judgment, are highly unlikely to ever be elected president of the United States," McConnell said on that occasion.
"Mitch is a loser for our nation and for the Republican Party who would not have been re-elected in Kentucky without my endorsement, which he begged me for because he was going down," Trump replied in a statement to Fox News.
However, despite the evident hostile relationship, McConnell decided to support Trump's candidacy, maintaining the Republican union ahead of the November general elections.
