In Fundraising Emails, McConnell Pledges to Stop the “Impeachment Circus”

Senate Television/AP

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As the impeachment trial of Donald Trump has progressed, Sen. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has wasted no time trying to cash in on it. The Kentucky senator, who is up for reelection this year in the Trump-friendly state, blasted out two fundraising emails this week, asking supporter for help in “standing up to the corrupt Democrats” and promising to bring the trial to a close.

“This has been the most unfair impeachment in American history, but thanks to your Republican Majority, this impeachment circus will stop in the Senate,” an email sent Thursday by McConnell’s campaign read. It asked his supporters to donate anywhere from $10 to $250 to “join our fight.” Another email, sent out on Monday, asked readers to donate up to $500 to “fight back against Nancy Pelosi and this rushed impeachment process.” McConnell promised: “I won’t let the Democrats’ partisan impeachment games go on any longer.”

From the outset, McConnell has indicated that he would do everything in his power to ensure that Trump’s trial would not, in fact, be fair. Early on, he led Republicans in blocking efforts to subpoena documents and witnesses, including former national security adviser John Bolton and White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney. A week later, the New York Times revealed that Bolton, in a draft of his forthcoming book, alleged that Trump had told him he wanted withhold military aid from Ukraine until that country agreed to help investigate the Bidens. Still, McConnell didn’t budge, setting the stage for another vote, expected Friday, on whether to allow witnesses. That vote that is widely expected to fail

All the while, McConnell’s reelection campaign has been sending out emails calling the process “despicable” and saying that he’d “rather be fighting to confirm judges to our nation’s courts and lower taxes.”

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The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we need readers to show up for us big time—again.

Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

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WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We can’t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we need readers to show up for us big time—again.

Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

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