Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell has called US President Joe Biden’s voting rights speech as “nonsense.”
“What utter nonsense. It would be laugh-out-loud funny if it wasn’t so completely and totally irresponsible,” the Kentucky Republican said on Wednesday.
“This is our new president who promised to lower the temperature, bring America back together and rebuild a civil society where we can dialogue as fellow citizens,” he added.
The comments by McConnell come after Biden lambasted efforts by former President Donald Trump and his Republican allies to change the election laws, describing it as an existential threat to democracy.
“The big lie is just that. A big lie,” Biden said. “If you lose, you accept the results. You don’t call facts fake and try to bring down the American experiment just because you’re unhappy. That’s not statesmanship. That’s selfishness.”
On Wednesday, the Texas Senate approved a restrictive voting legislation after Democratic lawmakers in the state House fled to Washington to evade passage of the bill in the lower chamber.
The bill, passed by a party-line vote of 18-4, includes restrictions on absentee voting and forbids drive-through voting, which many believe were the Democrats’ trump card in the 2020 presidential elections.
This came a day after 51 Democrats in the state’s lower house decamped to Washington to block passage of the bill by preventing a quorum that is necessary for a special session.