On January 3, the new US Congress will convene in Washington, DC. But for the first time in eighteen years, a major Republican leader will not remain in power: Senator Mitch McConnell.

Since 2007, McConnell has served as Senate GOP chairman, guiding members of his caucus through four different presidencies and countless legislative hurdles.

Experts say his term The longest-serving party leader in the Senate It will ultimately be remembered as a turning point for Republicans and Congress as a whole.

Under McConnell, American politics has moved away from the laggards and consensus builders of previous eras. Instead, McConnell helped usher in a period of extreme partisan politics that paved the way for figures like… Next President Donald Trumpleader of the Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement.

“First and foremost, he expanded the trend of obstruction of minorities in the Senate,” Stephen S. Smith, professor emeritus of political science at Washington University in St. Louis, told Al Jazeera.

Smith noted that McConnell led the Republican majority for only six of his 18 years as Senate leader. He spent the rest of his term packing a minority in the 100-seat Senate to disrupt the rival Democratic Party’s agenda.

“Second, he will be known for deepening partisan polarization in the Senate,” Smith said. “Although McConnell is not conservative or extreme by today’s standards, he was a highly partisan leader.”

Despite his commitment to the Republican Party, some see McConnell as a potential bulwark for figures like Trump, with whom he once worked. I clashed in the past.

Although it is Step down from party leadershipMcConnell intends to remain in the Senate for the remainder of his six-year term. But it remains to be seen to what extent McConnell will serve as a check on Trump’s ambitious second-term agenda.

“I would be very surprised to see him provocative in a public way. His influence is going underground,” Al Cross, a veteran reporter and columnist who has covered McConnell’s tenure, told Al Jazeera.

“I usually play the villain.”

McConnell has had a long and storied career in the Senate. In 1984, he made his first attempt for a seat in the House, ousting the incumbent Democrat.

He has remained undefeated ever since. In 2020, he won his seventh consecutive term.

His rise to the top of the Senate came without significant opposition. The retirement of former Senate Republican leader Bill Frist in 2007 left the position vacant.

But even from his first days as Senate leader, McConnell has earned a reputation as a hardliner and obstructionist.

During his first year as Republican leader, The New York Times described him as working with “almost robotic efficiency” to undermine Democratic policies, despite leading a minority in the Senate.

“Mr. McConnell and his fellow Republicans are playing tight defense, blocking almost every bill proposed by the slim Democratic majority that they have increasingly been able to dictate whatever they want,” reporter David Hirzenhorn wrote.

McConnell quickly embraced his appearance as a partisan warrior, describing himself as the “grim reaper” of progressive proposals.

One editorial column called him “Senator No” for refusing to work across the aisle. McConnell himself once greeted reporters by saying, “Darth Vader has arrived.”

“Over the three decades that I have been a U.S. Senator, I have been the subject of many profiles,” McConnell wrote in the opening lines of his 2016 memoir. “I usually play the villain.”

Smith, a professor at the University of Washington, described McConnell as sparking a “transformation” in the Senate as a result of his hard-line approach.

Before McConnell’s leadership, Smith said the Senate had seen only “occasional minority obstruction.” But after that, the chamber became known in political circles as the “sixty-vote Senate.”

This moniker is a reference to the 60 votes required to overcome minority filibuster, also known as the filibuster.

Under McConnell, “acting on legislation of significance would face minority obstruction and require 60 votes for approval,” Smith explained.

Bending rules

One of McConnell’s most divisive moments came in 2016, with… death Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.

Normally, when a justice dies, the sitting president has the right to nominate a replacement. But Scalia’s death came 11 months before the pivotal presidential election. The then president, Democrat Barack Obama, was approaching the end of his last term.

McConnell did an amazing — and fast — job. Political gamble. Within hours of Scalia’s death, the Republican leader announced that he would decline to call a vote to confirm Obama’s chosen replacement.

“The American people should have a voice in choosing the next Supreme Court justice. “Therefore, this vacancy should not be filled until we have a new president,” McConnell said in a statement.

Left-leaning publications such as The Nation denounced McConnell’s decision as an assault on the United States Constitution. “This rejection blew away norms,” journalist Alec McGillis wrote in ProPublica.

But McConnell’s gambit changed the balance of power on the court for generations to come.

In November of that year, American voters elected Trump—a political newcomer—to his first term in the White House, paving the way for further shifts in Washington norms.

Trump was eventually nominated Three right-wing judges To the Supreme Court, incl One to replace Scalia. This has consolidated the conservative majority on the bench, which is expected to shape American law for generations to come.

Trump later credited McConnell as an “ace in the hole” and “partner.”

“Mitch realized, as I did, that since judges hold office for life, the impact of judicial nominations can be felt for thirty years or more,” Trump wrote in the introduction to McConnell’s memoir. “Transforming the federal judiciary is the ultimate long game!”

Trump’s competition

But in the run-up to the formation of a bold new Trump administration in 2025, McConnell has increasingly turned to… to speak Against the president-elect and his isolationist “America First” program.

The two Republican leaders have done so over and over again Butting headsAnd the relationship between them Noticeably frosty.

Trump has publicly called McConnell an “old crow” and denigrated his “China-loving wife” Elaine Chao, a slap at her Asian heritage.

Meanwhile, McConnell responded with his own combative words, which implied similarities between Trump and the isolationism of the 1930s.

“We are in a very dangerous world now, reminiscent of before World War II,” McConnell told the Financial Times in December. “Even the slogan is the same. ‘America First.’ That’s what they said in the 1930s.

After vacating his leadership position in January, McConnell is expected to take on the role of chairman of the Senate Defense Appropriations Subcommittee.

In his new position, he is likely to call for strengthening the US military to confront threats posed by adversaries such as Russia, Iran, and China.

But at the age of 82, with Health challenges Including the recent decline, experts say McConnell is unlikely to offer significant resistance to the incoming Trump administration.

“Since Senator McConnell is out of his leadership position and given his physical fragility, I don’t expect much continued opposition from him,” Daniel Ziblatt, a political science professor at Harvard University, told Al Jazeera.

“It is possible that casting a dissenting vote here or there might make a difference. But his track record does not leave me holding my breath.”

No greater institutionalization

However, Herbert Weisberg, a political science professor at Ohio State University, expects McConnell to serve as an accidental president. Dissenting voiceEspecially since the Senate is considering some of Trump’s controversial nominees for high-level government positions.

“He typically wants to defer to a Republican president on appointments, but he will be cautious about unusual Trump nominees. He may be willing to vote against a few of them, but not all of them,” Weisberg told Al Jazeera.

Indeed, McConnell — a polio survivor — issued a General warning New administration officials should “avoid” efforts to “undermine public confidence” in “proven treatments” for fear of disrupting their Senate confirmation hearings.

The statement came immediately after Trump’s health nominee Robert F. Kennedy Jr It has been linked to an attempt to overturn approval of a polio vaccine in The New York Times.

But no Republican is likely to block a nomination or legislation, noted Stephen Okun, a U.S. politics, government and trade analyst.

Republicans hold a Majority 53 people In the next Senate. Many in the party strongly support Trump’s leadership.

Assuming a unified Democratic opposition, Okon explained, “four Republican senators would be needed to stop anything a future President Trump brings to the Senate.”

Okon added that McConnell was unlikely to take on the role of dissident — “only when Donald Trump pursues the most aggressive actions that would run counter to the American national interest.”

After all, party loyalty has been one of the core tenets of McConnell’s leadership. Experts like journalist Cross believe that McConnell will not want to miss the opportunity to use the power of the Senate to shape presidential policy.

“I can’t think of any greater founder than Mitch McConnell,” Cross said. “He loves the Senate, and that’s what he aspires to be. “He does not want to give up his role in advice and approval.”