Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has reportedly stated that President-elect Donald Trump’s victory places Americans in “a very, very dangerous world,” emphasizing that he intends to spend his final two years in the Senate pushing back against the growing Trump-fueled isolationism within the GOP.
The 82-year-old Kentucky Republican, who resigned last month as the Senate’s longest-serving party leader, has a complicated relationship with the incoming president.
While McConnell has worked to significantly shift the country to the right—much of it during the first Trump administration—he is not a fan of Trump or his isolationist worldview, which is spreading throughout the Republican Party.
“We’re in a very, very dangerous world right now, reminiscent of before World War II,” McConnell told the Financial Times on Wednesday. Even the slogan is ‘America First.’ “That’s 1930s talk.”
He made similar remarks before the election, telling Kristen Welker on NBC’s “Meet the Press” in April that the world is “more dangerous” than before World War II due to the rise and evolution of terrorism.
The interventionist senator emphasized how Trump and the current GOP are reverting to pre-World War II isolationism, a foreign policy stance that opposes American military intervention in other countries’ political affairs, including war.
Trump and his allies have urged the United States to stop sending money to Ukraine, which has been fighting Russia for more than two years.
The former and incoming president has also claimed that enemies within the United States are more dangerous than Russia and China, which McConnell strongly disagrees with.
“The cost of deterrence is considerably less than the cost of war,” the senator told the Times. “To most American voters, I believe the simple answer is ‘Let’s stay out of it.'”
The argument from the 1930s is no longer valid. Thanks to [former President Ronald] Reagan, we know what works: demonstrating peace through strength rather than simply saying it.”
In one of many examples of putting the GOP first, McConnell told Welker in April that, while he dislikes Trump personally, he would support him as the Republican presidential nominee.
The senator told the Times that he voted for him in November, but he did so to support “the ticket” rather than the individual candidate.
“The election is over, and we’re moving on,” he told the publication when asked if he regretted not doing more to prevent Trump from becoming president again.
“He has an enormous audience, and he just won a national election, so there’s no question he’s the most influential Republican out there.”
Trump is also not a fan of McConnell, recently calling him a “disgrace” for endorsing him.
John Thune of South Dakota, who has declared he will not seek reelection after serving the remaining two years of his current term, replaced McConnell, who has had numerous health scares in recent years, as the GOP’s Senate leader.