by Richard A Viguerie, CHQ Chairman
Today, CHQ Chairman Richard Viguerie joined conservative leaders Ken Cuccinelli II, President, Senate Conservatives Fund, L. Brent Bozell III, Jenny Beth Martin, Co-Founder, Tea Party Patriots, David Bozell, President, For America and Adam Brandon, President, FreedomWorks sending a letter to the Senate Republican leadership making the case that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s failed leadership and betrayals of the conservative – populist voters that brought President Trump to the White House have become an anchor around the neck of Republican Senators in the 2018 Republican primaries that can only be removed by the resignation of McConnell and his entire leadership team.
“Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s failures and betrayals of the conservative populist voters who brought President Trump to the White House have become an anchor around the neck of Republican Senators in the 2018 Republican primaries,” said conservative direct marketing pioneer Richard A. Viguerie.
“Mitch McConnell acts like a Minority Leader, letting Far Left Democrats run the show on Capitol Hill, charged Mr. Viguerie, Chairman of ConservativeHQ.com. “As the leader of the alleged conservative party on Capitol Hill he is at best incompetent, and more likely on the other side, leading the opposition to President Trump’s agenda.”
“Far from helping President Trump drain the swamp, McConnell has revealed himself to be an anti-conservative leader of the Washington establishment and protector of the swamp, who is silent as Democrats expand government, rushing us towards a socialist America.”
“What conservatives want is a Republican version of Chuck Schumer, someone who is always on offense for his party’s agenda.”
“President Harry Truman cost the Republicans their Senate majority in 1948 with his campaign against the Republican ‘Do Nothing Congress.’ When Republican donors echo Truman’s words and close their wallets and conservative activists agree and stay home, today’s Republican Senators should take heed and demand new leadership, before they are defeated in the primaries,” concluded Mr. Viguerie.
Complete text of the letter to Senator McConnell and the Senate Republican leadership team follows:
Senator Mitch McConnell
317 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510Subject: Failure of Leadership
Dear Senator McConnell,
2017 has been a disappointing year for the millions of Americans who fully expected, and had every right to expect real change in Washington. Republicans were given full control of the federal government. They – you – have done nothing. Worse, it is painfully clear that you intend to do nothing because, as is most apparent, you had no intention of honoring your solemn commitments to the American people. You were not going to “drain the swamp.” You are the swamp.
You and the rest of your leadership team were given the majority because you pledged to stop the steady flow of illegal immigration. You’ve done nothing. You pledged to reduce the size of this oppressive federal government. You have done nothing. You pledged to reduce, and ultimately eliminate the out-of-control deficit spending that is bankrupting America. You have done nothing. You promised to repeal Obamacare, “root and branch.” You’ve done nothing. You promised tax reform. You’ve done nothing.
You don’t even show up for work.
While your attacks on those within the Republican Party who were attempting to keep the GOP’s promises in the era of President Obama are now legendary, your current failure to deliver on the highest priority commitments to the American people is nothing short of shocking.
Perhaps the greatest betrayal – and that is what it is – is your failure to repeal Obamacare, the single most devastating piece of legislation against freedom ever crafted. Every single Republican in federal office today is there because of the pledge to end this horror. We are now in October of 2017. The Republicans control the White House, the House of Representatives, and the Senate. The GOP controls it all, thanks to that commitment.
President Trump and the House of Representatives have done their part. You sank it all.
President Trump reasonably asked when he arrived in the White House “Where is the bill?” After seven long years, you didn’t have a bill ready to go. You’d scheduled no committee hearings when you knew some in your caucus would not tolerate a bill without hearings. You had no plan at all.
America has not forgotten that Obamacare does not apply to you. You and your leadership team saw to that, even when far more ethical members of Congress tried to change that slippery exemption. That is not “leadership.” That’s cronyism, and precisely why the American people want the swamp drained.
By this time we could have been at work building the wall to protect Americans from the flow of illegal immigration, and also the flow of terrorists bent on wreaking destruction on our towns and cities. But you haven’t allowed it.
By this time in Ronald Reagan’s administration, even with an opposition party controlling the House, his tax cut package had been the law of the land for months, and America was on her way to an explosion of historic growth. But under your “leadership,” there’s not even a commitment to real reform.
You confirmed President Trump’s nominee for the Supreme Court, but you’ve also left our judiciary hanging in the balance. With well over 100 vacancies on the federal bench and 50 nominees awaiting action in the Senate you all have performed the Herculean task of confirming … seven?! That’s less than one judge per month!
Reasonable people can disagree on the larger issue of abortion, but science has proven that 20 week-old babies in the womb can feel the pain and torture of being aborted. The House, addressing the scientific community’s concerns and consensus, has passed the Pain Capable Act three times. President Trump has publicly stated his eagerness to sign this legislation. Not only will you and your leadership team not lift a finger to advance this bill and help end these atrocities, your chief deputy, Senator John Cornyn, deemed “Pain Capable” to be “not a short-term priority,” all but declaring the bill dead-on-arrival.
Defunding the abortion mill Planned Parenthood is another promise you have failed to deliver on. Chief among your responsibilities is to be stewards of taxpayer resources, and yet, inexplicably, Planned Parenthood continues to receive $500 million in federal funds annually, with no end in sight.
Perhaps more could be accomplished if you and the rest of your Gang of 5 leadership team would work harder, and require the rest of the Senate to do the same. The American people work 8-10-12 hours daily. How hard do their elected representatives work? On this, the 282nd day of 2017, you all have barely worked more than 100 days! And many of those “days” count coming in for a vote or two at 5:30 p.m.
Many Americans celebrated “Columbus Day.” What would they think if they knew – if you told them – you have arranged it so you and your colleagues celebrate “Columbus Week”?
In the real world this level of performance would get you fired.
When one compares the number of bills passing through the House to the Senate’s lack of performance, your leadership looks even less capable. As Speaker Ryan recently noted, the House is passing bills – including items central to your campaign promises – and not only do they languish in the Senate, but you and your leadership team publicly declare some of them dead on arrival.
In addition to not repealing Obamacare, not reigning in spending and debt, not restraining then-President Obama’s massive expansion of government, not reducing the power of the bureaucracy (especially the IRS), not only failing to secure our borders but fighting for amnesty and open borders, you and your leadership team have proven to be abject failures.
Your legalized bribery through deceitfully advancing the Export-Import Bank and other schemes that benefit donors but not ordinary Americans, and your extremely selective support for one part of one part of the U.S. Constitution (that being that part of the First Amendment related to free speech, but only insofar as it relates to campaign financing that you favor) has made it clear that you and your leadership team will be brave fighters for your Washington-based fat-cat donors and your own power, but not for the American people, any identifiable principles, nor even for the very things you all said during your campaigns that you believed in.
Those substantive failures come on top of your vicious, continuous, merciless attacks on grassroots Republicans, but most especially conservatives. Why do you hate the very people who are the biggest bloc of voters supporting every single member of the GOP Senate Caucus?
You have told us in no uncertain terms, for many years, in many ways, that it is your purpose to “crush conservatives everywhere.”
Can you imagine what would happen to a football team in which the quarterback was continuously by word and deed making it clear that he loathed his offensive linemen?
You have used race-baiting tactics without reservation when it suited your purposes, but the minute Democrats used such tactics against you in your last Senate race you wailed and gnashed your teeth.
You have used the un-American tactic of “blacklisting” vendors who dared to work for candidates who were not the leadership’s chosen candidates.
You have abandoned good conservative GOP nominees for no other reason than that they were conservative. One need look no farther than the last election cycle when you abandoned the Republican grassroots’ Colorado Senate candidate – Air Force Academy graduate, African American veteran and twice-elected official Darryl Glenn.
In 2016, there were only two states in which the GOP had a chance to pick up Senate seats – Colorado and Nevada. In Nevada you led $25 million worth of spending on behalf of your chosen candidate, but you refused to spend any money on behalf of Darryl Glenn in Colorado simply because he was conservative.
Both candidates lost by three percentage points.
There sat another vote for Obamacare repeal, but you were willing to sacrifice a Republican senate seat rather than have a conservative whom you would not control join the Senate.
Don’t blame others for falling one vote short – the fault is yours and the rest of your Gang of 5 leadership team.
And it’s not just Darryl Glenn. We remember your support for Arlen Specter, for Charlie Christ over Marco Rubio, and for Planned Parenthood’s favorite Independent candidate, (chairman) Lisa Murkowski over GOP nominee Joe Miller in Alaska in 2010.
You and your leadership team – Senators John Cornyn, Roy Blunt, John Thune and John Barrasso – have made war with your own grassroots while cynically refusing to honor one solemn pledge after another to the American people.
It is time for you and your leadership team to step aside for new leadership that is committed to the promises made to the American people. America is too good for you to lead it.
(Signed)
Ken Cuccinelli II
President, Senate Conservatives FundL. Brent Bozell III
Richard A. Viguerie
Jenny Beth Martin
Co-Founder, Tea Party PatriotsDavid Bozell
President, For AmericaAdam Brandon
President, FreedomWorks
Printed with permission by ConservativeHQ.com
