Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell renewed his feud with Rick Scott, criticizing the Florida GOP senator’s proposal to put expiration dates on federal programs after President Joe Biden used it to tar Republicans as seeking to phase out Social Security and Medicare.
(Bloomberg) — Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell renewed his feud with Rick Scott, criticizing the Florida GOP senator’s proposal to put expiration dates on federal programs after President Joe Biden used it to tar Republicans as seeking to phase out Social Security and Medicare.
“Unfortunately, that was the Scott plan. That’s not a Republican plan, that’s the Rick Scott plan,” McConnell told Kentucky radio host Terry Meiners on Thursday. McConnell said he dismissed key parts of Scott’s plan last year, including a call for all Americans to pay at least some income taxes, a provision Scott eventually dropped after a widespread backlash.
“I think it will be a challenge for him to deal with this in his own reelection in Florida,” McConnell said, noting the concentration of seniors in that state. McConnell said his criticism of Scott wasn’t because of Scott’s unsuccessful effort to unseat him as party leader last year, but instead was because it’s “a bad idea.”
Scott, for his part, has said repeatedly that he doesn’t support cutting Medicare or Social Security, but he hasn’t specifically exempted them from his “Rescue America” proposal to sunset all legislation every five years unless Congress acts to keep the laws on the books. He defended his plan this week, while challenging Biden to a debate and accusing him of lying about his plan.
On Friday, Scott announced a new proposal to require a two-thirds vote to reduce or cut Medicare and Social Security benefits. He also proposed redirecting $87 billion from the IRS to those programs, though that would be projected to increase the deficit from reduced tax collections. And he is seeking a provision prohibiting savings in Medicare from being used to pay for other spending programs.
He separately told reporters McConnell is “backing up Biden again.”
“He doesn’t believe that we ought to have a plan,” Scott said. “I believe we ought to be telling the American public what we’re going to do.”
Scott said he’s committed “to preserve Medicare and Social Security” but warned of a day of reckoning when investors won’t want to buy US debt. “I don’t believe we ought to be running deficits,” he said.
Scott’s plan attracted widespread attention last year because he served at the time as chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee.
Scott has also sought to deflect the attacks by pointing out Biden’s own proposals decades ago during his Senate career to sunset federal programs and squeeze spending on Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.
In the meantime, Scott has sought to capitalize on his feud with McConnell, who he’s labeled in fundraising emails as a Washington insider and part of the “swamp.” Scott has accused McConnell of retaliating against him by taking away his seat on the Senate Commerce Committee.
“Maybe they’ll take away my parking spot next?” he asked in one fundraising email.
Speaker Kevin McCarthy had also taken Medicare and Social Security off the table for broader debt limit talks before Biden’s State of the Union.
(Updates with Scott response, new bill starting in fifth paragraph.)
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