Rick Scott Goes After Mitch McConnell for Dissing Quality of GOP Senate Hopefuls: 'We Have Great Candidates'
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Eric Lee/Bloomberg/Getty (2) Rick Scot (left)t, Mitch McConnell
Florida Sen. Rick Scott is criticizing Mitch McConnell, weeks after the Senate minority leader cited "candidate quality" in suggesting Republicans' chances of taking control of the Senate in November have diminished.
"Sen. McConnell and I clearly have a strategic disagreement here … We have great candidates," the National Republican Senatorial Committee chair said in an interview with Politico this week. "He wants to do the same thing I want to do: I want to get a majority. And I think it's important that we're all cheerleaders for our candidates."
Scott's comments come weeks after McConnell told reporters he thought "there's probably a greater likelihood the House flips than the Senate," pointing to "candidate quality" of the Republican nominees for Senate.
"Senate races are just different — they're statewide, candidate quality has a lot to do with the outcome," McConnell said, NBC News reported.
McConnell continued: "Right now, we have a 50-50 Senate and a 50-50 country, but I think when all is said and done this fall, we're likely to have an extremely close Senate, either our side up slightly or their side up slightly."
Though McConnell didn't mention any Senate hopefuls by name, multiple news outlets point to struggling Trump-backed candidates like Dr. Mehmet Oz in Pennsylvania, Herschel Walker in Georgia and others as those McConnell was likely referencing in his comments.
In his own interview with Politico, Scott chided those who "trash talk" Republican candidates, saying, "If you trash talk our candidates … you hurt our chances of winning, and you hurt our candidates' ability to raise money. I know they're good candidates, because I've been talking to them and they're working their butts off."
McConnell has recently been the target of others in his own party, including former President Donald Trump, who last month called the Republican Senate minority leader a "broken down hack politician" for what he believes is a lack of support for the GOP's 2022 midterm candidates.
In a post on Truth Social, Trump also insulted McConnell's wife, former Trump administration official Elaine Chao, calling her "crazy."
"Why do Republican Senators allow a broken down hack politician, Mitch McConnell, to openly disparage hard-working Republican candidates for the United States Senate?" Trump wrote on his social media platform. "This is such an affront to honor and to leadership. He should spend more time (and money!) helping them get elected, and less time helping his crazy wife and family get rich on China!"
Chao, who served as secretary of transportation during the Trump administration, resigned from her cabinet-level position on Jan. 7, 2021, citing Trump supporters' attack on the U.S. Capitol the day before.
RELATED: Trump Insults His Former Transportation Sec. Elaine Chao and Her Husband, GOP Sen. Mitch McConnell
Trump and Scott's remarks about McConnell signal a growing rift in the Republican party, which is increasingly being split into two camps: those who support the former president, and those who don't.
While many Trump-aligned Republicans have performed well in primary races, it remains unclear how well the same candidates will do in a general election.
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Trump's picks tend to be, like himself, election deniers. They are also often extreme in their views — which some media outlets have noted could prove a liability come November.
Indeed, some of the candidates themselves appear to have taken note of the uphill battle, with at least one pivoting toward the center of some hot-button issues in recent weeks.
