WASHINGTON — Mitch McConnell made history on Tuesday, becoming the longest serving Senate leader in American history, surpassing Mike Mansfield, a Democrat from Montana who logged 16 years in the role.
McConnell, Kentucky’s longest-serving senator, is now approaching his 17th year leading the Republican caucus since first being tapped to steer the GOP in November 2006.
“The greatest honor of my career is representing the Commonwealth of Kentucky in this chamber and fighting for my fellow Kentuckians,” McConnell said on the Senate floor on the first day of the new congressional session. “But the second-greatest honor is the trust that my fellow Republican senators have placed in me to lead our diverse conference and help them achieve their goals.”
McConnell returns to the role of minority leader in 2023 after Republican Senate candidates underperformed during the 2022 midterm election, with losses in Pennsylvania, Georgia, Nevada and Arizona. McConnell’s counterpart, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York, enters his seventh year at the helm of Democrats.
McConnell will need to deal with the undercurrents of a developing presidential campaign and likely continued attacks from former President Donald Trump, who has already launched a 2024 comeback bid.
But McConnell isn’t expected to change his signature posture of low-key restraint, even as members of his party embrace a more direct offensive against the Biden administration. McConnell will actually appear with President Joe Biden in Covington, Ky. on Wednesday to tout new infrastructure spending.
Returning to the White House Monday evening, Biden mentioned his long friendship with McConnell, even if they’re frequently at odds politically.
The visit is a nod to bipartisanship that will almost certainly ruffle the feathers of the most strident members of his party who are eager to punch holes in Biden’s political armor.
“He achieves gains for his party where he can (the most recent omnibus spending bill scored massive increases in defense spending, for instance) but never lets partisanship or ideology outweigh his governing responsibilities,” wrote Scott Jennings, a former McConnell political aide, for CNN.
In his floor speech Tuesday, McConnell paid tribute to the qualities in former Senate leaders that he sees as being key to his own endurance during turbulent political times.
“There’ve been leaders who rose to the job through lower-key, behind-the-scenes styles; who preferred to focus on serving their colleagues rather than dominating them. And that…is how Senator Michael Joseph Mansfield of Montana became the longest-serving Senate leader in American history until this morning,” McConnell said.
After swearing in new and re-elected members, including Sen. Rand Paul, the Senate proceeded to go back on recess until Jan. 23.
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