Rick Scott alleges that McConnell retaliated against him following his failed leadership bid

Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) claimed that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) removed him from an influential committee position after his failed challenge to remove the veteran GOP leader.

In an interview with Politico, Scott laid out his plans to take over McConnell’s Senate leadership position, making him the third Senate Republican to do so. The Florida senator has had a fraught relationship with McConnell over the years, the true extent of which he revealed in the interview.

In February 2023, Scott briefly ran to unseat McConnell as Senate minority leader — an effort that failed when put to vote. He claimed on Friday that McConnell was enraged by the challenge, and retaliated against him.

“Well, I got kicked off committee. I got kicked off commerce,” he said. “I think, I’ve never done a real study of this, but I think I’ve probably run the biggest company of anybody that’s ever served in the Senate before — 25,000 employees. I’ve done business all my life. .. and I got kicked off of commerce. I mean, that’s clearly retaliation, no ifs, ands, or buts about it.”

Scott said he was notified by text about the decision about a week after the unsuccessful vote to unseat McConnell.

He also claimed McConnell told his donors not to give him any more funds, which had a noticeable effect on his funding.

The feud dated back to the 2022 election, when Scott was appointed as National Republican Senatorial Committee, in charge of the Senate campaigns of that year. According to Scott, differing visions between McConnell and himself were largely to blame for the poor Republican performance that year.

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He ceded that his performance as NRSC chairman was less than optimal, but largely blamed McConnell. Scott said that while he had a plan, McConnell did not, which crippled the organization.

“We needed to have an overall plan,” he said. “We didn’t. OK. But if you’re the NRSC chair, you don’t get to do that. That was driven by the leader of the Senate, who made the decision not to have a plan. He was very clear.”