WASHINGTON
— At a private conclave with the billionaire Koch brothers’ political
apparatus this year, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican
leader, laid out a confrontational agenda for a Republican-controlled
Senate aimed at dismantling President Obama’s legislative successes
through the federal budget.
In an audio recording leaked to The Undercurrent, a liberal-leaning YouTube channel, and initially reported by the magazine The Nation,
Mr. McConnell told the mid-June gathering in Dana Point, Calif., that
if the Republicans gained control of the Senate and retained control of
the House in November, Congress could use the budget process to force
the president to roll back his priorities.
“In
the House and Senate, we own the budget,” he said, explaining that the
initial blueprint on taxes and spending does not require the president’s
signature. “So what does that mean? That means that we can pass the
spending bill. And I assure you that in the spending bill, we will be
pushing back against this bureaucracy by doing what’s called placing
riders in the bill. No money can be spent to do this or to do that.
We’re going to go after them on health care, on financial services, on
the Environmental Protection Agency, across the board. All across the
federal government, we’re going to go after it.”
The
channel released audio of three other Republicans in tough Senate races
— Representative Tom Cotton of Arkansas, Representative Cory Gardner of
Colorado and Joni Ernst, a state senator in Iowa — all of whom praised
Charles G. and David H. Koch and the millions of dollars they have
provided to help Republican candidates.
Continue reading the main story
To
a large extent, Mr. McConnell’s promises are more bluster for the
Republican donor base than a foolproof plan. Through a budget procedure
called reconciliation, Republicans could clear a path to tax legislation
or changes to entitlement programs that could pass later in the year
with simple majorities in the House and the Senate.
But
unless a Republican majority plans to end the filibuster on legislation
as Democrats ended it on some presidential nominees, spending bills
with “riders” would need 60 votes in the Senate. If the Republicans win
control of the Senate, their majority is almost certain to be short of
60.
Republicans
said the recordings were insignificant. Josh Holmes, a senior McConnell
campaign aide, said the senator was in no way suggesting a strategy to
shut down the government unless Mr. Obama capitulates.
Nonetheless, the audio recordings
are likely to become fodder for the campaigns in Arkansas, Colorado,
Iowa and Kentucky. Democrats, most notably Senator Harry Reid of Nevada,
the majority leader, have tried to demonize contributions by the Koch
brothers as corruptive to the political system.
In
Arkansas, especially, the audio could touch a nerve. Mr. Cotton, a
freshman House member, skipped a popular political event in his state,
the Bradley County Pink Tomato Festival, to attend the Koch brothers’
meeting in California. According to the audio, he was repaid with praise
for his willingness to hew to the most conservative line, even if it
meant voting against legislation popular in his state.
“There
are times when the candidate is running and, frankly, it’s just someone
that, you know, there’s no better alternative, right?” said Tim
Phillips, the president of Americans for Prosperity, the flagship of the
Koch brothers’ political empire. “That’s not the case in Arkansas. Tom
Cotton is a champion.”
He
continued, “This guy is running for the Senate, actually voting with 61
Republicans in the House to vote against the farm bill in Arkansas.”
The crowd burst into applause before Mr. Phillips added, “He did that knowing he was in a tough race.”
Mr.
McConnell also gave some ammunition to his Democratic opponent, Alison
Lundergan Grimes, when he promised that “we’re not going to be debating
all these gosh darn proposals.”
“That’s
all we do in the Senate, is vote on things like raising the minimum
wage,” he added. Mr. McConnell called the 2002 passage of the
McCain-Feingold campaign finance law “the worst day of my political
life.”
The
Grimes campaign responded quickly, saying, “Shockingly, Mitch McConnell
will do and say anything it takes to secure his grip on personal power,
including promising to hurt Kentuckians to benefit billionaires.”
Ms.
Ernst and Mr. Gardner made a pitch to donors that their support was
about more than the Senate races. If they win in November, it would lay
the groundwork for turning Iowa and Colorado Republican in the 2016
presidential race, they said. Mr. Obama won both states twice.
“If
we win Colorado, we overturn the narrative the Democrats are trying to
build about the interior Rocky Mountain states, that you can’t win
statewide in the Rocky Mountain West anymore,” Mr. Gardner said.
“We can defeat that notion. We can flip it upside down in Colorado by
winning in 2014, making the pathway for whoever our nominee is in 2016.”
Ms.
Ernst said: “We are setting the stage for Iowa as the
first-in-the-nation’s caucus that all of our presidential hopefuls come,
come to. We’re setting the stage in 2014 with a Republican victory, so
that likelihood is in 2016 we can go red as a state and assist any
Republican nominee from Iowa. So we’re setting the stage for the
presidency.”
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