Mitch McConnell has a brazen, unwavering message to every Republican – from U.S. Senators to voters across the country. Get on board. This is where we make our stand. We lock arms with Trump and Fox News Channel and every other person, group, and institution that is with us.

McConnell, who knows a thing or two about unhinged partisanship, is reinforcing the party line.

This is tribal warfare. Republican leaders will put aside the nation’s welfare, fidelity to truth, defense of the Constitution, and commitment to the rule of law to dismiss the Mueller report. The courts must be packed with rightwing ideologues (to preempt any meaningful progressive policies in the foreseeable future); tax giveaways must be dished to corporations and the wealthiest Americans; and when the fiscal crisis finally comes,  there is a social safety net to defund.

This has been Bill Barr’s signal – from his 4-page summary of the Mueller report, to his news conference at Justice, to his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee. This was Lindsay Graham’s signal, when he declared after the committee hearing, “I’m all good. I’m done with the Mueller report.”

These are the tribal chieftains  of the Grand Old Party – the ones a notch below Trump, but folks who are more entrenched; who play the game much better; who have been doing it for generations; and – along with others moving up in the hierarchy – will be doing it after Trump is gone.

And if Republican leaders stay on script — Attention to the Mueller report, concern with Presidential wrongdoing, commitment to traditional Congressional oversight are nothing more than unhinged partisanship — then this becomes an effective message for folks outside (or on the periphery of) the GOP tent. This message — repeated by party leaders and amplified by the mainstream media — will have far greater bandwidth than any Trump tweet or Fox News Channel broadcast.

Republicans who aren’t plugged into Hannity or Limbaugh; folks who voted for Obama in 2012 and Trump in 2016; low information voters, who don’t especially like Trump, but who don’t know why Congress can’t get anything done: they will hear a message that the dispute over the Mueller report is all just more bickering between the parties.

Mitch McConnell embraces the principle that bipartisanship harms the Republican agenda (see January 2011 quotation below). His signal to Republicans seeks to ensure that partisanship (which he is pretending to decry) is amplified. That intense partisan message helps Republicans muddy the waters regarding Trump and his Congressional enablers.

McConnell is a master of this game:

May 7, 2019 – on unhinged partisanship:

“This investigation went on for two years. It’s finally over. Many Americans were waiting to see how their elected officials would respond. With an exhaustive investigation complete, would the country finally unify to confront the real challenges before us? Would we finally be able to move on from partisan paralysis and breathless conspiracy theorizing? Or would we remain consumed by unhinged partisanship, and keep dividing ourselves to the point that Putin and his agents need only stand on the sidelines and watch as their job is done for them?”

March 24, 2019 – on Russian interference:

“It is deeply disturbing that the Obama administration was apparently insufficiently prepared to anticipate and counter these Russian threats,”McConnell said in a Senate floor speech. “It was hardly a secret prior to November 2016 that Putin’s Russia was not and is not our friend. And yet, for years, the previous administration ignored, excused and failed to confront Putin’s malign activities, both at home and abroad.”

Both former vice president Joe Biden and Obama White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough have accused McConnell of looking to soft-pedal their warnings about Russia interference before the election.

Date uncertain – on Russian interference: Here’s a quotation from Greg Miller’s book, The Apprentice, on McConnell’s role in squelching a bipartisan Congressional statement on intelligence officials’ conclusion that Russia was actively interfering with the 2016 election: “You’re trying to screw the Republican candidate,” declared Senator McConnell.

August 6, 2016 – on hijacking the Merrick Garland nomination:

“One of my proudest moments was when I told Obama, ‘You will not fill this Supreme Court vacancy.’”

January 4, 2011 – on saying ‘No’ to every single Obama legislative initiative for eight years:

“We worked very hard to keep our fingerprints off of these proposals,” McConnell says. “Because we thought—correctly, I think—that the only way the American people would know that a great debate was going on was if the measures were not bipartisan. When you hang the ‘bipartisan’ tag on something, the perception is that differences have been worked out, and there’s a broad agreement that that’s the way forward.”

October 23, 2010 – on his paramount goal for the country after the 2008 election:

“The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president.”

(Image: screen grab of McConnell’s remarks.)