Mike Pence Takes Shot At Mitch McConnell, Senate GOP

In an interview with Fox News last night, popular GOP Rep. and potential 2012 presidential candidate Mike Pence (Ind.) delivered a surprising slight to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Republican leadership in the Senate.

Here's the transcript, from GOP 12:

BRET BAIER: Do you think Republican leadership gets it?

MIKE PENCE: I think House Republicans get it. House Republicans -- I believe -- in the last year and a half have returned to our roots.

BAIER: Are you distinguishing between Senate Republicans?

PENCE: I think House Republicans get it.

BAIER: Okay. [laughing]

PENCE: I think that the opportunity for Republicans in the House of Representatives to provide that check on the big government liberalism of this Administration is very real.

BAIER: And you'd say that to Mitch McConnell, as well?

PENCE: [smiling] I think House Republicans get it.

The level of disregard that Pence shows toward Mitch McConnell may be a sign that the Indiana congressman still has some lasting issues of trust when it comes to the Senate Minority Leader's recently redefined stance on earmarks. Pence, a longtime opponent of earmarking, was one of the first people to join Republican efforts to ban the practice. McConnell, an avid earmarker in the past, was reluctant to back the move and claimed that it wouldn't actually help close the deficit. He threw his support behind the measure only after getting pressure from his conservative colleagues and constituents.

WATCH:

Comments

[thepoliticalcat]

06:49 AM on 11/20/2010

Can't say I'm brokenhearted over Mitch McConnell's going down, but it is revolting to see the same sw!ne who rushed to kiss his ring now putting the boot in with glee.

[jerryatthebeach]

07:30 PM on 11/19/2010

I thought those two shared a room on C street.......

[joel123]

07:05 PM on 11/19/2010

Mconnell and Bohner will be one of the reason the Democrats will win in 2012. The are acting two childish, it will not get them too far. Eventually the American people will get sick of them.

[theobserver4]

10:45 AM on 11/20/2010

I'm already sick of them and they haven't even shown their ultimate petty grandstanding in all its yet. Just wait till Boehner gets the gavel...yuck

[TitaniumAvatar]

05:01 PM on 11/19/2010

Mike Pence takes shot at Mitch McConnell.

Luckily Mitch was able to pull his head back into his shell and avoid the blow.

[thepoliticalcat]

06:50 AM on 11/20/2010

Of course, nobody outside his own state knows who Mike Pence is. At least, Mitch has the consolation of knowing he's well-known enough to incur a little public h8.

[blue53]

04:24 PM on 11/19/2010

Could the problem be that Mitch just isn't into the Religious Right such as The C Street Family--who now think they are in charge of the Congress. McConnell and Boehner are going to have problems with the Christian Nationalists--like DeMint, Bachmann, Pence, Price, King, Inhofe, Enzi, Thune, Wamp, Pryor--and the many more chosen. Just wait and see how many of these gems voice their opposition. They take their orders from Doug and David Coe, Family Research Council, Herritage, Robertson, Dobson, Barton etc.

[syllepsis]

07:32 PM on 11/19/2010

McConnel's wing of the GOP,the Federalist Society, will figure out how to get the C Streeters in line eventually.

What they lack in religious conviction they will more than make up in cunning.

[thepoliticalcat]

06:50 AM on 11/20/2010

And money.

[theobserver4]

10:48 AM on 11/20/2010

Yea pretty much....the C Streeters are marching to the orders of fundamentalism after all. By the very definition their minds are more malleable than a baby's; it'll be funny to see cunning establishment GOPers twist these clowns in knots while they scramble to find passages to justify their change in position. There are definitely 2 wings of the party cunning and evil and loud and stupid. I'd put money on cunning and evil.

[BeasleysMom]

04:12 PM on 11/19/2010

The gop has no loyalty, no ethics, no values or morals. They sway with the wind of public opinion. Someone falls out of favor with the public, they immediately chastise that person. Policy is suddenly not liked? Then they are against it. And, the opposite is true. Someone or a policy or statement is popular? Well, then the cons are for it. The only thing these people care about is their next re election bid. And, baggers go along, no matter what. No matter how egregious, no matter how much it hurts Americans.

[j bennett]

04:07 PM on 11/19/2010

Take the time to enjoy one of Life's many small pleasures-a particularly noxious virulent snake eating it's own tail. Bon Appetit.

[ausman98]

02:25 PM on 11/19/2010

This all took place on Fox, so it's suspect from the start.

[Purcy]

01:48 PM on 11/19/2010

I wish I could find one republican that I could say I actually like.

[Purcy]

01:54 PM on 11/19/2010

I should add one republican in Washington...I actually do like some who are not in Washington.

[Raw Ron]

12:02 PM on 11/19/2010

All of these rethugs are just bad people. Voting to block unemployment benefits for millions of Americans right before Christmas under the guise the growing dept and in the same breath want to continue tax cuts for the riches Americans that are going to add 700 billion to the dept.
How any person in their right mine would vote for the party for the rich is beyond me.

[Dellany Hall]

12:27 PM on 11/19/2010

I live in KY and it is beyond me as well. My husband and I have this conversation a lot and being from KY and a democrat as well makes us an endangered species here. We have common sense and as I asked my husband today "are we the people here in KY that stupid or that blind" I have yet to figure out why the people here in my state continue to vote for this kind of politician. I am not sure who is worse Boehner, McConnell or Paul, etc., as none of them make any sense in anything they say or do and the only interest they have are fighting for the rich and doing absolutely nothing for the middle class and poor. My opinion is that McConnell is laughing at the people of KY all the way to the bank, he has found a bunch of pigeons and is making a killing off the backs of normal working kentuckians and whats more is he does not even bother to hide it, and the people of this state just keep on voting for him and others just like him. I have to ask myself "what is wrong with this picture" and just how ignorant can people be here in this state, they keep voting these people in time after time after time.

[oscartucker]

03:29 PM on 11/19/2010

Well, republicans do not have to be concerned about unemployment benefits, for ALL republicans are working! That extension of unemployment benefits would have been only for Democrats, and that just could not happen. ALL republicans earn over $250,000 per year, so that's the reason the Bush tax cuts have to kept in place. The people who are republicans in your state HAVE TO look out for themselves, so they MUST keep MMc and others in office.

[thepoliticalcat]

06:52 AM on 11/20/2010

The Bouche tax cuts will result in at least a TRILLION added to the national debt.

[Rendy Bee Mulyono]

11:04 AM on 11/19/2010

Let's see how mr. white lipless does in January and beyond.

[Ken Maddox]

10:27 AM on 11/19/2010

Republicans have spent the last two years claiming to be doing penance for past sins. The claims are hollow and the penance is nonexistent.
What is apparent is that this is the same Republican Party that Newt Gingrich and crew used to take out a contract on America.
These people are to be avoided. They will destroy our nation, and do so from the pulpit.

[warren stickney]

10:24 AM on 11/19/2010

MCCONNELL GOT TURNED OVER AND IS STUCK ON HIS BACK, COULD SOMEONE PLEASE TURN HIM OVER SO HE DOESNT GET BAKED IN THE SUN !

[Ken Maddox]

10:29 AM on 11/19/2010

Please, please just leave him alone. He is a right winger, and doesn't need any of our socialist aid. He would rather just do it himself.

[oscartucker]

03:39 PM on 11/19/2010

If you were to help him, MMc would rant that you did help, BUT he would not want you to put him on his back again and walk off.

[Ken Maddox]

10:24 AM on 11/19/2010

In my limited capacity to do so, I call for the resignation of Sen. Mitch McConnell. His public statement, that he is unwilling to participate in the governing of our nation, disqualifies him from serving in the US Senate.
His stated purpose of intent to discredit, defeat, and/or remove the current president are not among the duties for which he was elected.
Mitch McConnell has made public his intentions of abandoning the people and the State of Kentucky.
He has sold Kentucky for a few gold coin and for the power his ego demands. Mitch McConnell has no power or will to refuse the demands placed upon him by the Corporate interests that sponsor him. Mitch McConnell should resign immediately from the US Senate, and allow the Governor of Kentucky to select a true representative of Kentucky.

[Dellany Hall]

12:33 PM on 11/19/2010

Thank you well said and all to true. I personally would love to see the man resign, retire, move to BFE, or whatever it might take to get his arse out of the position he is in. He has never and will never do a dam thing for the people here in this state nor any other state. The only thing he has in mind is to sabotage Obama which in and of itself is dispicable for someone in his position to come out publicly and say something like this. I frankly don't understand his way of thinking or his attitude and never will. Faved

[Glenda Sitnek]

09:39 AM on 11/19/2010

And by the way, did anyone else notice HP forgot to put the Palin name in this headline?