Rick Scott still open to taking Mitch McConnell’s job

National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman Rick Scott may not have had a winning strategy to flip the Senate to the GOP,  but he remains interested in assuming leadership of the minority caucus.

And he was saying Sunday that people are interested in him potentially leading the Senate Republicans, even in the minority.

“A lot of people have called me to see if I would run,” Scott said on Fox News Channel’s Sunday Morning Futures.

He noted that while his “focus” is the runoff election in Georgia, he’s open to taking McConnell’s job if it comes down to it.

“I’m not going to take anything off the table,” Scott told host Maria Bartiromo. “But my job right now is to do everything I can do to help Herschel Walker. I’m going to be there today helping Herschel. That’s what my focus is. We shouldn’t be having these elections.”

With Democratic incumbent Catherine Cortez-Masto prevailing in Nevada, Democrats are assured of at least 50 seats. Since Democrats control the Vice Presidency, they control the Senate no matter what happens in the Georgia runoff next month.

But despite Republicans remaining in the minority, and Senators like Marco Rubio calling for a postponement, a vote nonetheless appears imminent. Scott’s chagrin was a constant in the interview.

“Well, first off, it doesn’t make any sense,” Scott said.

“I’ve been up here four years. What is our plan?” Scott asked rhetorically. “What is our plan? What are we running on? What do we stand for? What are we hellbent to get done?”

“There’s no plan to do that,” Scott continued. “The leadership in the Republican Senate says ‘No, you cannot have a plan. We’re just going to run against how bad the Democrats are’ and actually then they cave into the Democrats.”

The plan language is no accident. The schism between Scott and McConnell was illustrated by their public split over Scott’s “12-point plan to rescue America.” McConnell slammed the plan’s suggestion of review of federal entitlement programs as a nonstarter if he led Senate Republicans next year.

“And now they want to rush through an election. We haven’t even finished what’s happening in Georgia,” Scott said.

“They want to rush through an election without doing any assessment of what we’ve done wrong.” Scott continued. “Insanity is doing the exact same thing and thinking you’re going to get a different result. We won’t.”

Sunday’s spot continued the Senator’s damage control on friendly media outlets. On Friday, Scott described the election as a “complete disappointment.”

“Here’s what happened to us. Election Day, our voters didn’t show up. We didn’t get enough voters. It was a complete disappointment,” Scott told Fox News’ Sean Hannity.

Before last Tuesday, Scott offered a series of defenses of the 2022 candidates who emerged from Primaries while countering McConnell’s doubts that Republicans had more than a 50/50 shot at taking back the Senate due to questionable candidates in certain races.

Scott said Republicans could win up to 54 seats this November. Even if Georgia flips and gives the GOP 50 seats, that prediction clearly didn’t come close to panning out.

Yet despite a knockdown attempt against Scott in POLITICO, which outlined Scott’s intentions to mount a wild-card challenge to McConnell if the GOP had gotten a clear-cut Senate majority Tuesday night, it’s clear even an unsuccessful election outcome is not shaking Scott’s belief that Republicans in the Senate need a different direction from leadership.