03.02.22

ICYMI: McConnell on ‘America’s Newsroom’

WASHINGTON, D.C.U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) joined Bill Hemmer and Dana Perino this morning on Fox News’ America’s Newsroom. Click here to watch the full interview or see below for highlights:

On President Biden’s Remarks on Ukraine:

“I do think the President was giving himself a little more credit that we ought to give the Ukrainians. I think the demonstration of incredible bravery, of their stunningly impressive president, is the reason the rest of the world is rallying to the cause.

“Vladimir Putin’s invasion has done more to unify NATO than any president of either party has been able to accomplish in all these years. A complete transformation of German policy, for example. Finland and Sweden saying maybe we ought to join NATO…

On Putin:

“There should be no confusion about Vladimir Putin. There has been some confusion lately. He is a thug. He is a killer. He has been on the rampage. And this will not end well for him…

“I think the precipitous withdrawal from Afghanistan was a message to people like Putin — that America was rethinking our forward-leaning position in the world. I don't think, if we hadn’t cut and run, [that] Putin would have tried this at all.”

On President Biden’s State of the Union Address:

“On the domestic front, it seems to me the President didn't pivot at all. He didn't offer anything new. He didn't go in a different direction.

“I remember when Bill Clinton, after getting his butt kicked, said ‘the era Big Government is over.’ I was thinking maybe President Biden would do a pivot of some sort, to get people to take another look at him. Because his approval rating is really in the tank.”

On the Administration’s Disastrous Anti-Energy Policies:

“The President is not doing anything to increase domestic production. We were energy independent in 2019. We were actually not only meeting our own needs, but exporting oil and gas. We ought to be pivoting in the same direction the Germans went last weekend. And they were the greenest country in Europe…

“All the President has to do is just change! Quit trying to make it harder to produce on public lands. Quit making it harder to export LNG. This is within the purview of the executive branch. The President could, with the stroke of a pen, get us back in the production business — so that not only could we meet our own needs, which we did as recently as 2019, but export to Europe as well.”

On Washington Democrats Fueling Inflation: 

“I think he was arguing for what they've been trying to do all year, after they passed the so-called ‘American Rescue Plan’ which created a 40-year high of inflation. They actually, at the end of the year, tried to pass what they called BBB, which would poor more gasoline on the flames and make inflation even worse.

“I don't think anything the President said last night is likely to deal effectively with raging inflation. They’ve already created that by dumping $2 trillion on the economy last year on a Democrat-only vote, which produced a 40-year wave of inflation.

On President Biden’s Far-Left Approach:

“He’s got problems across the board because they made the wrong policy decision. Where did he go wrong? He ran as a moderate, but as soon as he got elected, he signed up for Bernie Sanders’ agenda. And Bernie Sanders’ agenda did not work.”

“The President didn't get a mandate to turn America into Bernie Sanders' vision of our future. We need to be operating within the 40-yard lines. If you want to operate in the middle, we'll talk and do business on things that we can agree on.”