Senate Republican Minority Leader Mitch McConnell was given the opportunity to take full credit for “singlehandedly” reshaping the Supreme Court to enable it to, as is expected after a leaked draft opinion – strike down Roe v. Wade.
He refused. Repeatedly.
In fact, not only did he refuse to take credit when CNN’s Manu Raju handed it to him, he refused to even comment on the leaked opinion, a 90-page document that harshly overturns the nearly 50-year-old decision from 1973 that acknowledged abortion is a constitutional right.
Instead, McConnell lectured reporters that “the story today” is the leak, not what the opinion says, which is pure political propaganda and gaslighting.
“You spent decades trying to remake the court, overturn Roe, you’re singlehandedly responsible for the 6-3 majority, so do you take personal credit for abortion rights likely to go away for millions of people in this country?” Raju asked.
“I think the story today,” McConnell replied, “is an effort by someone on the inside to discredit the institution of the Senate,” he added. (It’s unclear why he said the Senate and not the Supreme Court.)
That was not the only time McConnell told reporters what the story is.
“You need – it seems to me, excuse the lecture – to concentrate on what the news is today,” McConnell declared. “Not a leaked draft, but the fact that the draft was leaked.”
McConnell’s admonitions are pure propaganda. The news that affects millions of Americans is that abortion is about to become illegal for them, and soon after, contraception, and LGBTQ rights including sex and marriage. A leaked draft won’t even make the history books.