Feb. 20 (UPI) — Former Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell announced on Thursday he will not seek re-election for his seat in 2026, ending his career as one of the body’s most influential power broker.
On his 83rd birthday, McConnell, R-Ky., made it official with an announcement on the Senate floor.
“Seven times my fellow Kentuckians have sent me to the Senate,” he said, according to ABC News. “Every day in between I have been humbled by the trust they place in me to do their business, right here.
“Representing our commonwealth has been the honor of a lifetime. I will not seek this honor for an eighth time. My current term in the Senate will be my last.”
McConnell served a record 18 years as GOP Senate leader before stepping down last year. Since then, he has been one of the few Republican Senators to vote against Cabinet nominees put up by President Donald Trump. Three times he has voted against nominees.
While in the Senate leadership role, he is credited with single-handedly giving conservatives a 6-3 majority on the Supreme Court, refusing to hold a hearing on a replacement for Justice Antonin Scalia in 2016 while President Barack Obama was president. Trump appointed Neil Gorsuch to the position.
Then with only months left in President Trump’s first term, he fast-tracked a replacement for liberal Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, to allow Trump to replace her with conservative Justice Amy Coney Barrett.
“Thanks to Ronald Reagan‘s determination, the work of strengthening American hard power was well underway when I arrived in the Senate,” McConnell said, according to The Hill. “But since then, we’ve allowed that power to atrophy.
“And today, a dangerous world threatens to outpace the work of rebuilding it. So, lest any of our colleagues still doubt my intentions for the remainder of my term: I have some unfinished business to attend to.”
Former Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron on Thursday announced his candidacy to replace McConnell in the Senate.
“Kentucky, it’s time for a new generation of leadership in the U.S. Senate. Let’s do this,” Cameron said Thursday afternoon in a post on X.
Cameron included an image of him with his wife and two children in the post that includes his name in large red letters above “U.S. Senate” and beneath a red image of Kentucky.
Cameron lost his election bid to become Kentucky’s governor in 2023 when incumbent Gov. Andy Beshear beat him in the general election with 53% of the popular vote.
Although he is a Democrat with a proven record of winning statewide elections on the GOP-dominated commonwealth, Beshear last year said he will not run to replace McConnell in the Senate.
His chief political strategist on Thursday confirmed Beshear still won’t run for the Senate.
“To spare my inbox, texts and voicemail today, just putting this here and on the record: He is not running for Senate,” Hyers said of Beshear in a social media post quoted by the Lexington Herald Leader.
Other challengers to fill the Senate seat include Republican Rep. Andy Barr and businessman Nate Morris, Politico reported.