McConnell turned to authoritarian leaders to influence Trump on Ukraine: 7 takeaways from forthcoming book

WASHINGTON – Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has shepherded his fellow GOP lawmakers through some of the most dramatic moments in modern American politics, including battles over Supreme Court nominees, impeachment trials and America's role on the world stage.

He has also seen a transformation of the Republican Party led by former President Donald Trump, with whom he has shared a mutually tense relationship that has at times flared up into the public sphere.

The details of that relationship have largely remained private. But a new book from Associated Press Deputy Washington Bureau Chief Michael Tackett, "The Price of Power," details McConnell's account of his rise to power, his maneuvers to remake the Supreme Court, his impressions of Trump.

It draws from records provided by McConnell about his life, including personal letters, official correspondence and a detailed oral history McConnell recorded over the course of decades.

The longtime leader privately described then-President Donald Trump as "stupid as well as being ill-tempered," "despicable" and a "narcissist," after the 2020 election. He also said "it’s not just the Democrats who are counting the days” until Trump left office.

Trump Campaign Senior Advisor Brian Hughes noted in a statement to USA TODAY that McConnell "endorsed President Trump to return to the White House as the 47th President of the United States."

McConnell told the AP that his comments about Trump "pales in comparison" with what now-close Trump allies Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., have said about him in the past. "We are all on the same team now,” McConnell said.

Here's are some key takeaways from the book, which is set to be released on Oct. 29, just a week before Election Day:

McConnell turned to authoritarian leaders to influence Trump on Ukraine

McConnell has frequently been at odds with members of his own party over continued U.S. assistance to Ukraine, which the GOP leader vehemently supports. He relentlessly – and successfully – advocated for additional funds to be sent to the eastern European country that has been battling Russia since February 2022.

Trump has long been skeptical of U.S. aid to Ukraine. But McConnell thought he could convince enough Republicans to join his cause if the former president remained silent on the issue.

So McConnell sent "Trump-friendly emissaries to ask authoritarian leaders in other countries who had influence with the former president to try to persuade him" to stay out of the debate, Tackett wrote. "Some made trips to Mar-a-Lago."

Trump did not mount a campaign to block the effort, as he has done for other bills he opposed since leaving office. The book does not specify which leaders, or if Trump actually spoke to or was convinced by the foreign officials. The former president is still a critic of additional U.S. aid to Ukraine.

Trump almost pulled Kavanaugh

Trump nominated Brett Kavanaugh to fill an open position on the Supreme Court in 2018.

The confirmation process erupted when psychology professor Christine Blasey Ford alleged Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her in high school. McConnell found her to be "a sympathetic and credible witness," Tackett wrote.

So did Trump, who called McConnell and asked whether he should pull Kavanaugh's nomination. McConnell advised him "it's only halftime," and to see how Kavanaugh defended himself.

When Kavanaugh was confirmed, Trump gave McConnell rare praise as the "greatest leader in history."

McConnell snubbed Trump 30 years ago

During McConnell's first reelection campaign in 1990, then-New York businessman Donald Trump sent the new senator a $1,000 campaign donation.

Trump's casino in Atlantic City was struggling and would eventually go bankrupt. McConnell wanted nothing to do with it.

The pair had never met or spoken before, but McConnell returned the donation along with a note.

"While I thank you for your contribution, I have noticed several stories in the last few weeks about your financial difficulties. Having been through difficult financial times myself, I know how hard it can be on a person," he wrote. "Although I am certain you will recover, I have decided to return my contribution of $1,000 because it appears you may need the money more than I do right now."

'Space suits' considered during COVID

Arguably McConnell's biggest legacy will be how he successfully maneuvered to confirm conservative legal minds to the U.S. Supreme Court and the rest of the federal judiciary with over the course of years.

In the book, McConnell describes how seriously he took the threat of the coronavirus pandemic, even skipping an event at the White House in which Trump announced now-Justice Amy Coney Barrett due to concerns about getting sick.

But when it came time to approve the nominee, McConnell told his staff that if it took "space suits" to get senators to vote safely, so be it.

They talked with Anthony Fauci, then the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, about whether NASA had protective gear they could wear. And they secretly built a protective plexiglass tunnel that would allow senators to technically qualify as having "two feet on the (Senate) floor" to vote, which was never used.

McConnell said Trump did 'a number of things' that may be impeachable

House Democrats impeached Trump for the first time in 2019, arguing he sought foreign interference in the 2020 presidential election. The then-president was accused of pressing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to help smear Biden in return for aid, but was acquitted by the Senate in 2020.

McConnell said at the time that Trump "has done a number of things that one could argue, depending on your point of view, are impeachable," but added that the Democrats "finally seized on a couple of things that, frankly, are pretty weak."

The Republican leader then pushed against the Democrats' case and voted against convicting the president.

When Trump was impeached a second time following the Jan. 6 riot, McConnell said he was "not at all conflicted" about whether Trump's actions on that day were an impeachable offense.

"I think it is. Urging an insurrection and people attacking the Capitol as a direct result... is about as close to an impeachable offense as you can imagine, with the possible exception of maybe being an agent for another country." McConnell went on to vote against conviction, raising concerns it was bad precedent to convict someone who was no longer in office.

Trump was charged in a federal indictment with trying to overturn the 2020 election, but he has not been charged with inciting the Capitol riot.

McConnell's words to GOP senators on Jan. 6

McConnell was upset by Trump's insistence, without evidence, that he won the presidential election in 2020.

When Congress convened on Jan. 6, 2021, to oversee the certification of the election results, he got word that a few senators – Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and Josh Hawley, R-Mo. – would be objecting.

He wanted to prevent more Republicans from joining them. He told his conference ahead of the vote, which would be interrupted by a mob of Trump's supporters storming the building, that it was his most important moment in his time as a senator. Cruz ultimately decided not to object and tried to convince Hawley to back down, too.

"This is about whether we're going to break this democracy," McConnell told GOP senators that day. "You are never going to cast a more important vote than this."

2023 fall was severe

McConnell, who was then the longest-serving party leader in American history and 81 years old, fell in the bathroom at a dinner in Washington in March of 2023.

At the time, staff reported that McConnell "tripped" and was being treated for a concussion. He was discharged from the hospital with a cracked rib.

But the fall was more significant than previously understood: It was a "violent" fall during which McConnell hit the ground so hard he "lost both of his hearing aids and was bleeding at the back of his head," Tackett wrote. "For a time, he also lost consciousness."

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: McConnell says Trump almost pulled Kavanaugh nomination: 7 takeaways