McConnell Attacks ‘America First’ Policies Despite Trump’s Massive Win

A vocal critic of President-elect Donald Trump is signaling plans to challenge critical aspects of the incoming administration’s foreign policy, which centers on the "America First" doctrine.

Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has openly questioned Trump’s approach, urging the president-elect to abandon what he describes as “America First’s flirtation with isolation and decline,” in an essay published Monday in Foreign Affairs.

The former Senate Republican leader is advocating for a foreign policy that includes many positions Trump opposed during his campaign. McConnell has called for increased foreign aid, commitment to free trade agreements, unwavering support for NATO, and additional arms transfers to Ukraine.

“The [Trump] administration will face calls from within the Republican Party to give up on American primacy,” McConnell wrote in his essay. “It must reject them. To pretend that the United States can focus on just one threat at a time, that its credibility is divisible, or that it can afford to shrug off faraway chaos as irrelevant is to ignore its global interests and its adversaries’ global designs. America will not be made great again by those who simply want to manage its decline.”

He added, “The response to four years of weakness must not be four years of isolation.”

McConnell’s comments, which endorse an interventionist foreign policy similar to that of the George W. Bush administration, emphasize the need for a larger defense budget to address multiple global threats. These remarks suggest that McConnell could strongly oppose Trump’s nominees and agenda.

“We’re in a very, very dangerous world right now, reminiscent of before World War Two,” McConnell told the Financial Times in an interview last week. “Even the slogan is the same. ‘America First.’ That was what they said in the ’30s.”

One of McConnell’s key disagreements with Trump is over the Ukraine conflict. The senator argues that the strategy to counter Chinese aggression cannot succeed if the United States allows Russia to claim victory in Ukraine.

“Standing up to China will require Trump to reject the myopic advice that he prioritize that challenge by abandoning Ukraine,” McConnell wrote in Foreign Affairs. “A Russian victory would not only damage the United States’ interest in European security and increase U.S. military requirements in Europe; it would also compound the threats from China, Iran, and North Korea.”

During the campaign, Trump pledged to end the Russia-Ukraine war and has repeatedly criticized President Joe Biden’s handling of tensions with Russian President Vladimir Putin. He promised to bring the conflict to a resolution before taking office. However, those pledges came before Biden’s escalation of the war, including authorizing U.S.-made missiles to strike Russian soil.

Speaking at a press conference on Monday, Trump described the conflict as “very complicated.” His remarks followed a recent meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Paris.

“It’s crazy what’s taking place. It’s crazy. I disagree very vehemently with sending missiles hundreds of miles into Russia,” Trump told TIME during his 2024 Person of the Year interview. “Why are we doing that? We’re just escalating this war and making it worse. That should not have been allowed to be done. Now they’re doing not only missiles, but they’re doing other types of weapons. And I think that’s a very big mistake.”

McConnell’s critique comes on the heels of Trump’s decisive electoral victory over Democratic nominee Kamala Harris, marking the first Republican popular vote win since 2004.

Reports indicate McConnell was one of four senators who blocked former Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz from becoming Trump’s attorney general. He has yet to meet with Trump’s defense secretary nominee, Pete Hegseth, or his pick for director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard.

Despite stepping down from Senate GOP leadership, McConnell has vowed to continue opposing Trump’s foreign policy vision. As the incoming chair of the Senate Appropriations Defense subcommittee, McConnell will have a prominent platform to advocate for an expanded defense budget and increased military aid for Ukraine, according to the Daily Caller.