Mitch McConnell Quotes

The only tool the Democrats have is in the Senate, and it's the filibuster.

I do think [Barack Obama's] strategy for re-election is so misguided. He's counting on the Republicans to self-destruct, and they might, you know, but they might not. So he might be a one-term president.

Some of the reasons John McCain lost in 2008 were his lackluster campaign, his refusal to showcase Obama's extreme liberalism and, thus, his failure to demonstrate why he would make a better president than Obama.

In 2008 all the stars aligned perfectly for Obama's 6-point victory over John McCain. He was an inexperienced, untested neophyte, and successfully convinced enough voters to paint their own version of what hope-and-change was all about on the blank canvas he provided.

Barack Obama's class warfare will not work on this Republican nominee. Not in Utah.

Filibusters have proliferated because under current rules just one or two determined senators can stop the Senate from functioning. Today, the mere threat of a filibuster is enough to stop a vote; senators are rarely asked to pull all-nighters like Jimmy Stewart in 'Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.'

A politician wants to come off as a happy warrior. To be contemplative seems almost effete, fancy – dispiriting somehow to much of your audience. He [Barack Obama] is not afraid to be this way at all.

You have to have candidates who can actually win. The winners make policy; the losers go home.

I could have possibly beaten Senator McCain in the primary. Then I could have been the candidate who lost to Barack Obama.

The filibuster is used more aggressively, so I think doing each individual appropriations bill through regular order would be a home run. But I think that we should try to hit a few singles.

There's a line of thinking about Ted Cruz.

One of the reasons I think Barack Obama had the policy he did was purposely to create this flood of refugees from Syria. He wanted them!

The community itself didn't support the union. Now that's kind of interesting about [Barack] Obama, because Obama was supposedly a community organizer in Chicago at that time. Now I'm sure he read the Chicago Tribune, so he knew about it, but when he went to show his solidarity with the workforce, the first place he went was Caterpillar. I don't think he's forgotten, and the labor movement didn't react. Even radical labor historians didn't remember. It was only 15 years ago, after all, but that's a real triumph of propaganda in many ways.

Next week John Boehner will be sitting behind Barack Obama at the State of the Union address. I think Obama should purposely try to embarrass him by telling the story of 'Old Yeller.' The state of our Union is strong, but not so good for one special dog.'

George [Mitchell] introduced the idea that we'd go on a retreat [and] to really regularize caucuses. He's the one who had I think [Tom] Daschle become the Democratic Policy Committee chairman, so I think it lived through with Tom.

I think what President [Barack] Obama has done is to chart a steady course. When I was there, the first four years we had a lot of cleanup to do. We inherited a lot of bad feelings from the [George W.] Bush administration, and much of what I spent my time doing was traveling around the world reassuring friends and allies.

As you all know by now, Barack Obama sent out a cell phone text message at 3 a.m. on Saturday morning to tell everyone he picked Joe Biden as his vice president. How do you think this makes Hillary Clinton feel, huh? Finally, she gets a telephone call at 3 a.m., it's to tell her they picked Joe Biden.

I think that Donald Trump is very concerned about finding the right way to be effective in a responsible way. And he wants to be effective.

If I resign any time this year, he [President Obama] could not successfully appoint anyone I would like to see in the court. ... [A]nybody who thinks that if I step down, Obama could appoint someone like me, they're misguided.

I would never filibuster any President’s judicial nominee, period. I might vote against them, but I will always see they came to a vote.

The headline in the Washington Post: "Democrats Confident They Can Block Trump's Agenda After Spending Bill Win." They think now they can stop Donald Trump's agenda for the next 3-1/2 years. They've shown how to do it. The agenda tied to the budget. The budget tied to government shutdowns. The Republicans cave at the first mention of a government shutdown; ergo, they've shut down Trump. That's what they're thinking.

[Hillary Clinton] showed, while in the Senate, that ability to connect and reach across and to forge alliances. I think she will be better [than Barack Obama]. But I think the problem with connecting emotionally with the people remains at large is - in a wholesale way.

All we have to do is replace Obama. ... We are not auditioning for fearless leader. We don't need a president to tell us in what direction to go. We know what direction to go. We want the Ryan budget. ... We just need a president to sign this stuff. We don't need someone to think it up or design it. The leadership now for the modern conservative movement for the next 20 years will be coming out of the House and the Senate.

[Hamas] thought that if you go to elections you become a democrat for the rest of your life. They think that democracy is limited to one day in four years.

How to get people to vote against their interests and to really think against their interests is very clever. It's the cleverest ruling class that I have ever come across in history. It's been two hundred years at it. It's superb.