How Mitch McConnell can end on a high note

Mr. McConnell’s most consequential legacy is to have pushed the nation’s courts rightward. After Antonin Scalia died in February 2016, Mr. McConnell, as majority leader, denied even a hearing for President Barack Obama’s nominee to replace the late Supreme Court justice. That vacancy boosted 2016 turnout for Mr. Trump, perhaps decisively, and allowed the new president to nominate Neil M. Gorsuch to the high court. Mr. McConnell then changed Senate rules to prevent Democrats from filibustering Mr. Gorsuch’s nomination, eliminating the 60-vote threshold that had encouraged previous presidents to nominate less-radical picks. (Democrats had previously eliminated it for other judicial nominees.)

Four years later, after holding Republicans together in 2018 to confirm Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh, Mr. McConnell raced to replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg when she died six weeks before the 2020 election. In so doing, he tossed aside the arguments he made in 2016 that it is inappropriate to confirm a new justice in an election year. As a result, the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, and conservatives will likely dominate federal courts for at least another generation. Mr. McConnell also got hundreds of lower-court judges confirmed after blocking many of Mr. Obama’s nominees for the same slots.

Mr. McConnell changed the Senate, too. When in the minority, he refined and expanded the use of parliamentary procedures, particularly the filibuster, to obstruct Democrats. He boasted in 2010 that “the single most important thing” he wanted to achieve was making Mr. Obama a one-term president. When Republicans had unified control of government, he pressed through Mr. Trump’s debt-expanding 2017 tax cut bill, though he failed to repeal the Affordable Care Act — despite his best efforts.

For all the hardball he played, Mr. McConnell also knew when, and how, to cut deals. He took seriously his responsibility to avoid hitting the federal debt limit; he and then-Vice President Joe Biden worked together to keep the country from going over 2012′s fiscal cliff.

Mr. Trump’s takeover of the GOP, embracing a style of politics that was rough even for Mr. McConnell, ultimately undid the longtime Senate leader. Mr. McConnell’s six-year run as majority leader ended in 2021, when Democrats unexpectedly picked up Georgia’s two Senate seats in runoff elections — largely because of Mr. Trump’s election denialism, which depressed Republican turnout.

The day after those runoffs came the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol invasion. Mr. McConnell called Mr. Trump’s actions a “disgraceful dereliction of duty” and said the then-president was “practically and morally responsible.” But he voted to acquit Mr. Trump in his Senate impeachment trial, even as seven GOP senators supported conviction. That mistake came back to haunt the whole country — Mr. McConnell very much included. If he had rounded up nine more Republican votes in addition to his own, Mr. Trump could have been ineligible to run again in 2024. Instead, Mr. Trump is poised to be the GOP nominee for a third time, and Mr. McConnell is increasingly at odds with his party. If Mr. Trump wins, he will have far more pliable Republican leaders in Congress than in his first term.

Mr. McConnell worked in President Gerald Ford’s Justice Department and rode President Ronald Reagan’s coattails to a Senate seat in 1984. Lately, he has struggled with GOP populists who reject his understanding of conservatism. Mr. McConnell has maintained his Reaganesque convictions about the United States’ role in the world. He got 21 Senate Republicans to join him this month in supporting a $95 billion aid package for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan — despite Mr. Trump’s opposition. Now, he’s pressing the House to pass it.

During a Wednesday floor speech, Mr. McConnell acknowledged that his party has changed underneath him but pledged to stay true to his principles until his Senate term ends in January 2027. The minority leader has an opportunity to become a statesman, defending NATO, free trade, democracy, the rule of law and other things that undergird American strength. “For as long as I am drawing breath on this Earth, I will defend American exceptionalism,” he said. For all Mr. McConnell’s many flaws, there might come a day, sooner than many think, when even his harshest critics miss him.