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A second source familiar with the call told CNN that McConnell made it clear to his members Thursday that he is giving them room to vote conscientiously on such objections.
The conference call discussion comes after McConnell discouraged members from objecting in the first place. But now that Hawley has made it clear he is moving forward, members will have to decide for themselves whether to accept a state’s voter certification or not. There are 19 Republican senators facing re-election in 2022. Republicans have 21 seats to defend.
McConnell privately warned Republicans weeks ago that following the objection path would put his colleagues in the position of having to vote against President Donald Trump, or against the clear winner of the election with no basis to do so. Given Trump’s pull on the party, it would create an untenable position, particularly for those Republican senators who will soon face reelection.
There have been no credible allegations of voting problems that would have had an impact on the election, as claimed by dozens of judges, governors and election officials, the Electoral College, the Department of Justice, the Department of Homeland Security and the Supreme Court of USA
When Hawley did not speak on the call, Pennsylvania Sen. Pat Toomey, a retired Republican, explained to the conference why he believed the state was not a good test case for allegations of voter fraud, according to the second source familiar with the call.
That source added that Wisconsin Republican Senator Ron Johnson also spoke on the call about the importance of investigating any voter fraud, but as he has publicly stated, he does not plan to object to the electoral college certification process.
Thursday morning’s call was an all-member event, which McConnell has held fairly regularly due to Covid-19 and scheduling outages, according to two people with direct knowledge of what happened.
After telling the group to vote for his conscience, McConnell went on to tell his colleagues that even with a career as long as his, the vote would mark one of the most important, perhaps the most significant, he has ever cast in his life, and that would mark the same for each senator in the convocation, according to the two people.
The goal, one of the people said, was to underscore what is at stake at the moment given Trump’s current push to nullify the results and the support he has received from Republicans in Congress. McConnell has made it clear that Biden is president-elect, acknowledging reality in a lengthy speech in the Senate on December 15 that infuriated the president.
The two people said the purpose of the call was not explicitly Hawley’s decision to object, but McConnell asked her rationale several times before realizing she was not on the phone.
McConnell’s move came amid growing frustration within the conference on Hawley’s measure, especially among candidates for re-election in 2022. Some Republican senators voiced their discontent publicly Wednesday, but more have raised concerns directly with leadership, one of the two people said.
McConnell, in Thursday’s call, was attempting, at least in part, to address concerns raised by members to leadership, and to give other senators a chance to raise their concerns themselves, calling Hawley for an explanation.
“Pissed off” was how a Republican senator described much of the conference to CNN.
Hawley told reporters Wednesday that he had “alerted” the leaders of what he planned to do, but said he had not discussed it with his colleagues since they were all out of town.
Senator Ben Sasse was quick to criticize Hawley’s announced decision. The Nebraska Republican wrote on Facebook late Wednesday that he had urged fellow Republicans to “refuse” to object to the certification process and President-elect Joe Biden’s victory, calling the talks to do so a “dangerous tactic.”
After news of McConnell’s interrogation and Hawley’s absence from the conference call broke, Hawley sent an email to Republican senators to explain the reason behind his plan to object to next week’s account, according to a source.
The email largely follows the public statement Hawley released Wednesday and included a copy of that statement. He reiterated that the senator wants to use the objection to raise issues of concern related to whether states followed their own electoral laws.
McConnell’s efforts to manage the warring factions of his conference appear to go against the president’s hopes.
While in Mar-a-Lago during the holidays, Trump spoke with his associates about the possibility of overriding the results of the November elections when Congress meets to formally count electoral votes, said a source close to the White House. Trump still believes that the expected challenges from Republican lawmakers during that session could somehow give him a second term, the source said.
This story was updated with additional reports on Thursday.
CNN’s Jim Acosta, Kaitlan Collins, Rachel Janfaza, and Jake Tapper contributed to this report.
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