Following the McCain Institute’s event with U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), The Washington Post’s Paul Kane wrote about Senator McConnell’s words in tribute to Senator John McCain, and the work being done in the Senate to advance the McCain legacy of promoting America’s leadership and military might around the world.
Read the full column HERE and view excerpts below.
Republican war hawks find momentum, a trust-but-verify moment with Trump
McConnell, embracing McCain’s ethos, sees reasons to hope his side is gaining ground in Republican civil war over isolationism.
The Washington Post
By Paul Kane
August 2, 2025
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/08/02/mcconnell-trump-republicans-foreign-policy/
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The former Senate GOP leader, at an event hosted by the institute named for the late Arizona senator, reveled in John McCain’s “clear-eyed” assessment early in Vladimir Putin’s reign in Russia.
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… McConnell used the McCain Institute speech to deliver carefully worded critiques and compliments for the new administration’s security decisions.
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Democrats are struggling with how best to approach these foreign policy shifts, for now finding allies where they can, like McConnell.
“We worked very well together to craft a balanced, robust investment in America’s defense,” Coons said Wednesday.
Those two represent the heirs to the Senate’s two big national security intellects of 20 years: McCain and Joe Biden.
McConnell, who clashed with McCain on many things, always listened to his foreign policy suggestions, particularly when he served atop the Senate Armed Services Committee. And Coons, who holds Biden’s old Senate seat, could take over in 2027 as the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, a perch Biden held for more than a decade before becoming vice president in 2009.
Those committees have a different global outlook — Armed Services focused on military hard power vs. Foreign Relations’ diplomatic soft power — and McCain and Biden clashed vigorously as senators despite a deep friendship.
But in an era where Trump and some of his closest advisers talk about retreating from the world, McConnell and Coons worked closely together to push a Senate version of Pentagon funding that promotes America’s military footprint around the globe.
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[Sen. Peter] Welch attended McConnell’s speech at the McCain Institute event out of respect for his support for Ukraine, having heard many of the GOP leader’s speeches the previous two years about the issue when, as a freshman, Welch had to serve as the interim presiding officer.
“He has been a leader on the issue,” Welch said of McConnell.
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