McConnell in the preceding months had resisted such a move, even while Trump pushed for increased payments ahead of the Nov. 3 election.
“Donald Trump was itching for that same kind of lifeline in September and October, but McConnell’s idea at the time was different,” Grim said.
“That comment that he made in that call with Republican senators was sort of the last data point that you really needed to take your intuition and everything you felt you understood about McConnell’s approach to the general election and to Trump and take it to a place where you can say, ‘OK, now I’m confident that I can conclude that Mitch McConnell was quite fine with Donald Trump losing the presidential election,’” Grim added.
The remarks, which Trump made in a series of tweets while on vacation in Palm Beach, Fla., underscored the growing divide between Trump and his own party on multiple fronts.
Republicans fear that Trump’s divisive comments on the presidential election in particular could threaten GOP chances of retaining the Senate majority, which hangs in the balance of the Senate runoffs in Georgia next week.
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Trump tweeted Tuesday morning that Republican leaders were “weak and tired” for allowing a veto override of the defense policy bill, known as the National Defense Authorization Act. Trump vetoed the legislation last week because it does not include a repeal of Section 230, a tech company liability shield, and includes a provision mandating the renaming of Confederate-named military bases.
The House voted to reapprove the conference report on this must-pass legislation. Today the Senate will set up a final vote for tomorrow, Wednesday, with this chamber to follow suit, McConnell said from the Senate floor on Tuesday. For the brave men and women of the United States Armed Forces, failure is simply not an option. So when it s our time in Congress to have their backs, failure is not an option either. I would urge my Republican colleagues to support this legislation one more time when we vote tomorrow, McConnell added.
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But whether the Senate holds a veto override vote on Wednesday is in limbo. McConnell tried to set up the vote earlier but that effort was blocked by Democrats, who are trying to get a separate stand-alone vote to increase the amount of recently passed stimulus checks from $600 to $2,000.
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McConnell signaled separately that he could package the increase in direct stimulus checks, with a repeal of a tech shield that has emerged as a top target for Trump and election-related investigations. Trump, in his statement on signing the $2.3 trillion package, said the Senate would start the process for a vote that tackles the three issues. During this process, the president highlighted three additional issues of national significance he would like to see Congress tackle together, McConnell said. Those are the three important subjects the president has linked together. This week the Senate will begin a process to bring these three priorities into focus, he added.