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      McConnell and McCarthy’s Jan. 6 Fury at Trump Faded by February

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      In the days after the attack, Representative Kevin McCarthy planned to tell Mr. Trump to resign. Senator Mitch McConnell told allies impeachment was warranted. But their fury faded fast.In the days after the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol building, the two top Republicans in Congress, Representative Kevin McCarthy and Senator Mitch McConnell, told associates they believed President Trump was responsible for inciting the deadly riot and vowed to drive him from politics. Mr. McCarthy went so far as to say he would push Mr. Trump to resign immediately: “I’ve had it with this guy,” he told a group of Republican leaders.But within weeks both men backed off an all-out fight with Mr. Trump because they feared retribution from him and his political movement. Their drive to act faded fast as it became clear it would mean difficult votes that would put them at odds with most of their colleagues.“I didn’t get to be leader by voting with five people in the conference,” Mr. McConnell, the Senate Republican leader, told a friend.The confidential expressions of outrage from Mr. McCarthy and Mr. McConnell, which have not been previously reported, illustrate the immense gulf between what Republican leaders say privately about Mr. Trump and their public deference to a man whose hold on the party has gone virtually unchallenged for half a decade.The leaders’ swift retreat in January 2021 represented a capitulation at a moment of extraordinary political weakness for Mr. Trump — perhaps the last and best chance for mainstream Republicans to reclaim control of their party from a leader who had stoked an insurrection against American democracy itself.This account of the private discussions among Republican leaders in the days after the Jan. 6 attack is adapted from a new book, “This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden and the Battle for America’s Future,” which draws on hundreds of interviews with lawmakers and officials, and contemporaneous records of pivotal moments in the 2020 presidential campaign.Mr. McConnell’s office declined to comment. Mark Bednar, a spokesman for Mr. McCarthy, denied that the Republican leader told colleagues he would push Mr. Trump to leave office. “McCarthy never said he’d call Trump to say he should resign,” Mr. Bednar said.Representative Kevin McCarthy in the Capitol two weeks after the riot.Erin Schaff/The New York TimesNo one embodies the stark accommodation to Mr. Trump more than Mr. McCarthy, a 57-year-old Californian who has long had his sights set on becoming speaker of the House. In public after Jan. 6, Mr. McCarthy issued a careful rebuke of Mr. Trump, saying that he “bears responsibility” for the mob that tried to stop Congress from officially certifying the president’s loss. But he declined to condemn him in sterner language.In private, Mr. McCarthy went much further.On a phone call with several other top House Republicans on Jan. 8, Mr. McCarthy said Mr. Trump’s conduct on Jan. 6 had been “atrocious and totally wrong.” He faulted the president for “inciting people” to attack the Capitol, saying that Mr. Trump’s remarks at a rally on the National Mall that day were “not right by any shape or any form.”During that conversation, Mr. McCarthy inquired about the mechanism for invoking the 25th Amendment — the process whereby the vice president and members of the cabinet can remove a president from office — before concluding that was not a viable option. Mr. McCarthy, who was among those who objected to the election results, was uncertain and indecisive, fretting that the Democratic drive to impeach Mr. Trump would “put more fuel on the fire” of the country’s divisions.But Mr. McCarthy’s resolve seemed to harden as the gravity of the attack — and the potential political fallout for his party — sank in. Two members of Mr. Trump’s cabinet had quit their posts after the attack and several moderate Republican governors had called for the president’s resignation. Video clips of the riot kept surfacing online, making the raw brutality of the attack ever more vivid in the public mind.The mob breaking into the Capitol.Win McNamee/Getty ImagesOn Jan. 10, Mr. McCarthy spoke again with the leadership team and this time he had a plan in mind.The Democrats were driving hard at an impeachment resolution, Mr. McCarthy said, and they would have the votes to pass it. Now he planned to call Mr. Trump and tell him it was time for him to go.“What he did is unacceptable. Nobody can defend that and nobody should defend it,” he told the group.Mr. McCarthy said he would tell Mr. Trump of the impeachment resolution: “I think this will pass, and it would be my recommendation you should resign.”He acknowledged it was unlikely Mr. Trump would follow that suggestion.Mr. McCarthy spent the four years of Mr. Trump’s presidency as one of the White House’s most obedient supporters in Congress. Since Mr. Trump’s defeat, Mr. McCarthy has appeased far-right members of the House, some of whom are close to the former president. Mr. McCarthy may need their support to become speaker, a vote that could come as soon as next year if the G.O.P. claims the House in November.Representative Kevin McCarthy with Mr. Trump in Bakersfield, Calif., in 2020.Doug Mills/The New York TimesBut in a brief window after the storming of the Capitol, Mr. McCarthy contemplated a total break with Mr. Trump and his most extreme supporters.During the same Jan. 10 conversation when he said he would call on Mr. Trump to resign, Mr. McCarthy told other G.O.P. leaders he wished the big tech companies would strip some Republican lawmakers of their social media accounts, as Twitter and Facebook had done with Mr. Trump. Members such as Lauren Boebert of Colorado had done so much to stoke paranoia about the 2020 election and made offensive comments online about the Capitol attack.“We can’t put up with that,” Mr. McCarthy said, adding, “Can’t they take their Twitter accounts away, too?”Mr. McCarthy “never said that particular members should be removed from Twitter,” Mr. Bednar said.Other Republican leaders in the House agreed with Mr. McCarthy that the president’s behavior deserved swift punishment. Representative Steve Scalise of Louisiana, the second-ranking House Republican, said on one call that it was time for the G.O.P. to contemplate a “post-Trump Republican House,” while Representative Tom Emmer of Minnesota, the head of the party’s House campaign committee, suggested censuring Mr. Trump.Yet none of the men followed through on their tough talk in those private conversations.In the following days, Mr. McCarthy heard from some Republican lawmakers who advised against confronting Mr. Trump. In one group conversation, Representative Bill Johnson of Ohio cautioned that conservative voters back home “go ballistic” in response to criticism of Mr. Trump, demanding that Republicans instead train their denunciations on Democrats, such as Hillary Clinton and Hunter Biden.“I’m just telling you that that’s the kind of thing that we’re dealing with, with our base,” Mr. Johnson said.When only 10 House Republicans joined with Democrats to support impeaching Mr. Trump on Jan. 13, the message to Mr. McCarthy was clear.By the end of the month, he was pursuing a rapprochement with Mr. Trump, visiting him at Mar-a-Lago and posing for a photograph. (“I didn’t know they were going to take a picture,” Mr. McCarthy said, somewhat apologetically, to one frustrated lawmaker.)Mr. McCarthy has never repeated his denunciations of Mr. Trump, instead offering a tortured claim that the real responsibility for Jan. 6 lies with security officials and Democratic legislative leaders for inadequately defending the Capitol complex.Senator Mitch McConnell, left, with Senator Patrick Leahy after it was announced that Mr. Leahy would preside over Mr. Trump’s impeachment trial.Erin Schaff/The New York TimesIn the Senate, Mr. McConnell’s reversal was no less revealing. Late on the night of Jan. 6, Mr. McConnell predicted to associates that his party would soon break sharply with Mr. Trump and his acolytes; the Republican leader even asked a reporter in the Capitol for information about whether the cabinet might really pursue the 25th Amendment.Capitol Riot’s Aftermath: Key DevelopmentsCard 1 of 5Signs of progress. More

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      Income Taxes for All? Rick Scott Has a Plan, and That’s a Problem.

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      The “Plan to Rescue America” is dividing the party and cheering Democrats, and its author, Senate Republicans’ top campaign official, won’t stop talking about it.WASHINGTON — Senator Rick Scott of Florida, the somewhat embattled head of the Senate Republicans’ campaign arm, said one utterly indisputable thing on Thursday when he stood before a packed auditorium of supporters at the conservative Heritage Foundation: His plan for a G.O.P. majority would make everyone angry at him, Republicans included.It was an odd admission for the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee. His leader, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, has repeatedly told Mr. Scott to pipe down about his “11-Point Plan to Rescue America,” with its call to impose income taxes on more than half of Americans who pay none now, and to sunset all legislation after five years, presumably including Social Security and Medicare.It has divided his party, put Mr. Scott’s own candidates in awkward positions, and is already featured prominently in Democratic advertising. But after Thursday, it is clear the Republicans have not figured out how to address their Rick Scott problem.“Washington’s full of a bunch of do-nothing people who believe that no conservative idea can ever happen, nothing will change for the better as long as they’re in charge, and that’s why we’re going to get rid of them,” the senator said, ambiguous about who exactly “they” were. “So Republicans are going to complain about the plan. They’ll do it with anonymous quotes, some not so anonymous. They’ll argue that Democrats will use it against us in the election. I hope they do.”The senator insisted on the Heritage Foundation stage that his plan would raise taxes on no one, only to concede to reporters after the talk that it would — or that it wouldn’t, he couldn’t decide.“The people that are paying taxes right now — I’m not going to raise their rates; I’ve never done it,” he said, before adding: “I’m focused on the people that can go to work, and decided to be on a government program and not participate in this. I believe whether it’s just a dollar, we all are in this together.”But most adults who pay no income tax do work, and the plan makes no distinctions. “All Americans should pay some income tax to have skin in the game, even if a small amount. Currently over half of Americans pay no income tax,” it states.Last year, 57 percent of U.S. households paid no income tax, but that was by design. Successive Republican tax cuts, including President Donald J. Trump’s tax cut of 2017, which greatly expanded the standard deduction, took tens of millions of workers off the income tax rolls, though virtually all of them pay Social Security, Medicare and sales taxes.And for all of Mr. Scott’s evasions, the criticism is not coming just from the “militant left” that he denounced. The nonpartisan Tax Policy Center estimated that ensuring all households pay at least $100 in income taxes would leave families making about $54,000 or less with more than 80 percent of the tax increase. Those making less than about $100,000 would shoulder 97 percent of the cost.His leader, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, right, has repeatedly told Mr. Scott to pipe down about his plan.Stefani Reynolds for The New York Times“Let me tell you what would not be a part of our agenda,” Mr. McConnell told reporters in early March. “We will not have as part of our agenda a bill that raises taxes on half the American people, and sunsets Social Security and Medicare within five years.”For Democrats, Mr. Scott is a gift. The 2022 campaign is shaping up as a conventional midterm, focused on the economy under Democratic control. That means inflation, gas prices and candidate ties to an unpopular president.“If you’re in power and you’re presiding over inflation, sorry, it’s tough to be you,” Representative Patrick McHenry, Republican of North Carolina, told The Ripon Society, a conservative research group, this week.Mr. Scott’s plan has allowed Democrats to talk about the alternative: what Republicans would do with power. Mr. Scott’s plan is chock-full of language about making children say the Pledge of Allegiance, prohibiting the government from asking citizens their race, ethnicity or skin color, and declaring that “men are men, women are women and unborn babies are babies.”But its economic section has been the focus. Beyond taxing everyone, under the plan, all federal laws would sunset in five years. “If a law is worth keeping, Congress can pass it again,” the plan says. Taken literally, that would leave the fate of Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security to the whims of a Congress that rarely passes anything so expansive.Democrats are gleefully calling attention to it, even going so far as to promote the Republican senator’s speaking engagement on Thursday.“The chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee has put it on record in a document,” said David Bergstein, a spokesman for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, “and we are taking his word for it.”Mr. Scott’s ideas threaten to bring Republicans back to an economic argument they waged — and lost — before Mr. Trump won over wide swaths of white working-class voters with his pledges to leave entitlements alone and cut their taxes.In 2012, the Republican presidential nominee, Mitt Romney, committed a disastrous gaffe when he was caught on tape describing 47 percent of Americans as wealth takers, not wealth makers. In 2001, Jim DeMint, a House member from South Carolina at the time, who like Mr. Romney went on to the Senate, asserted that if more than half of Americans paid no taxes, they would vote to expand government largess for themselves and make others pay for it.“How can a free nation survive when a majority of its citizens, now dependent on government services, no longer have the incentive to restrain the growth of government?” he asked during a Heritage Foundation lecture, calling for all Americans to pay some income taxes.The vision of affluent Republicans counseling struggling workers to pay more taxes while they pay less was central to Mr. Trump’s critique of the party in the 2016 campaign.And Mr. Scott is an unlikely bearer of his revanchist message. He’s the richest man in Congress, worth around $260 million, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. In 2002, the sprawling hospital chain he ran agreed to pay more than $880 million to settle the Justice Department’s longest-running inquiry into health care fraud, including $250 million returned to Medicare to resolve charges contested by the government.Fellow Republicans are not rushing to embrace Mr. Scott’s plan.“I think it’s good that elected officials put out what they’re for, and so I support his effort to do it,” said Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, among the most endangered Republicans up for re-election in November. “That’s what he’s for.”But for Republican candidates, the issue is getting awkward. In Arizona, Jim Lamon, a Republican seeking to challenge the Democratic incumbent, Senator Mark Kelly, first called the plan “pretty good stuff” only to have his campaign retreat from that embrace.Senator Marco Rubio, Republican of Florida, said of the plan, “It’s good that people offer ideas.” His Democratic challenger, Representative Val B. Demings, nevertheless ran an ad on social media accusing him of embracing it.At a Republican Senate debate in Ohio on Monday, the current front-runner, Mike Gibbons, called the plan “a great first draft in trying to set some things we all believe in,” adding, “The people that don’t believe them probably shouldn’t be Republicans.”J.D. Vance, a candidate aligned with Mr. Trump’s working-class appeal, fired back: “Why would we increase taxes on the middle class, especially when Apple, Google, Amazon and Facebook pay a lower tax rate than any middle-class American in this room or in this country? It’s ridiculous.”Even as he denied his plan would do that, Mr. Scott on Thursday was bold in the criticism of his fellow Republicans, who are relying on him to help them win elections this fall. Timidity is “the kind of old thinking that got us exactly where we are today, where we don’t control the House, the White House or the Senate,” he said, adding: “It’s time to have a plan. It’s time to execute on a plan.” More

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      Can Republicans Win by Just Saying No?

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      History suggests that opposing the party in power is often good enough.In the 1946 midterms, Republicans united around a simple but powerful mantra: “Had enough?”The slogan was the brainchild of Karl Frost, an advertising executive in Boston. In two short words, it promised a rejection of both New Deal liberalism and the monopoly of power Democrats had held in Washington since the 1930s.It helped Republicans that the economy was in chaos. World War II had just ended, and supply chains were going haywire as the U.S. emerged from wartime price controls. Thousands of workers went on strike. Meat was scarce and expensive — so much so that Republican candidates patrolled city streets in trucks booming out the message, “Ladies, if you want meat, vote Republican.” They slapped President Harry Truman with the moniker “Horsemeat Harry.”“This is going to be a damned beefsteak election!” Sam Rayburn, the Democratic speaker of the House, privately fumed. By Election Day, Truman’s approval rating was just 33 percent. Republicans picked up 55 seats in the House and 12 in the Senate, taking power for the first time since 1932.“It was so bad for Truman that people were saying he should resign,” said Jeffrey Frank, author of “The Trials of Harry S. Truman.”This was the year that a young Richard Nixon won his first congressional election, defeating a five-term Democratic incumbent in suburban Los Angeles by running against New Deal “socialism” and for what he called the “forgotten man.” His campaign literature asked: “Are you satisfied with present conditions? Can you buy meat, a new car, a refrigerator, clothes you need?”What’s old is new again.Inflation is way up, some goods are hard to find and Democrats are staring at a similar wipeout in November. And Republicans, as our colleague Jonathan Weisman reports today, are debating just how forthcoming to be about their own plans. Senator Rick Scott, the head of the Republican Senate campaign arm, has an 11-point plan to “rescue America.” House Republicans are working on their “Commitment to America,” a political and policy agenda they plan to release in late summer. And today, Mike Pence, the former vice president, unveiled a 28-page “Freedom Agenda” platform.Some Republicans argue that none of it is really necessary. All they need to do to win back power is point to voters’ frustrations with the high prices of gasoline and groceries and say, essentially: Had enough?“This isn’t rocket science,” said Corry Bliss, a Republican strategist. “The midterms are a referendum on one thing and one thing only: Joe Biden and the Democrats’ failed leadership. Period. End of discussion.”‘What’s Mitch for?’Democrats are eager to turn this fall’s elections into a choice between the two parties rather than a referendum on their own performance.At times, President Biden has tried to corral Mitch McConnell, the Senate’s top Republican, into defining the party’s agenda. “The fundamental question is, what’s Mitch for? What’s he for on immigration? What’s he for? What’s he proposing?” Biden said in late January, adding: “What are they for? So everything’s a choice. A choice.”A Guide to the 2022 Midterm ElectionsMidterms Begin: The Texas primaries officially opened the 2022 election season. See the full primary calendar.In the Senate: Democrats have a razor-thin margin that could be upended with a single loss. Here are the four incumbents most at risk.In the House: Republicans and Democrats are seeking to gain an edge through redistricting and gerrymandering, though this year’s map is poised to be surprisingly fairGovernors’ Races: Georgia’s contest will be at the center of the political universe, but there are several important races across the country.Key Issues: Inflation, the pandemic, abortion and voting rights are expected to be among this election cycle’s defining topics.McConnell never took the bait. He’s said his focus is “100 percent” on “stopping this new administration” and has avoided presenting ideas that Democrats might be able to attack.“The fundamentals of a midterm election hold: It’s about the party in power,” said Zack Roday, a Republican strategist who is working on several Senate campaigns. “McConnell understands this better than anyone of the last 15 years.”So Democrats have taken to Scott’s plan like a drowning man to a life preserver, highlighting his call for every American to have “skin in the game” by paying taxes and accusing him of wanting to cut Medicare and Social Security. Senate Democrats are running a paid ad on Scott’s plan this week in key swing states, and on Thursday they bought a geo-targeted ad around the Heritage Foundation in Washington, during a speech that Scott gave at the conservative think tank.It’s an article of faith among many on the right that the 1994 “Contract With America” led by Newt Gingrich was responsible for that year’s Republican takeover of Congress. But Republicans in the Senate, led by Bob Dole of Kansas, never embraced it, while polls at the time showed that only a minority of voters had ever heard of the idea. Democrats would later exploit Gingrich’s unpopularity to gain seats in the 1998 midterms, a rare victory for the president’s party.Representative Kevin McCarthy of California, who hopes to become speaker of the House, shares Scott’s view that a plan is necessary, though they may differ on the details. At the recent policy retreat for House Republicans, McCarthy explained his hope of presenting Biden with legislation “so strong it could overcome all the politics that other people play.”To which Representative Jim Jordan of Ohio, a key McCarthy ally, added: “I think it’s real simple: You can’t do what you said if you haven’t said what you’ll do.”President Harry Truman and his daughter, Margaret, voting in Independence, Mo., in 1946. That year, Republicans picked up 55 seats in the House and 12 in the Senate.William J. Smith/Associated Press‘Just criticize rather than be specific’As a political strategy, though, no plan probably beats a plan.“If I were the Republicans, I would just criticize rather than be specific about my remedies, unfortunately,” said Geoffrey Kabaservice, a historian of the Republican Party.Michael Barone, the founding editor of the Almanac of American Politics, said he expected Republicans to win back the House and “probably” the Senate, regardless of how specific their plans were. A policy agenda, he said, is more important for determining “how you want to govern” once in power.For Republican leaders today, being in power poses a dilemma of its own. If they do win one or both branches of Congress, Democrats will be able to draw on a playbook made famous by the same president who was so humbled by the slogan “Had enough?” in 1946.Two years after his midterm drubbing, Truman mounted a comeback often hailed as the greatest in American political history, using the “do-nothing Congress” as his political foil.Never mind that Congress had been extraordinarily productive, passing more than 900 bills that included landmark legislation such as the Marshall Plan and the Taft-Hartley Act. Four months before Election Day, with his job approval rating stuck in the 30s, Truman went on offense.“He had just one strategy — attack, attack, attack,” writes David McCullough, another Truman biographer.At campaign stops, Truman called Republicans names like “bloodsuckers” and a “bunch of old mossbacks still living back in 1890.” At one appearance in Roseville, Calif., he said the “do-nothing Congress tried to choke you to death in this valley.” In Fresno, Calif., he said: “You have got a terrible congressman here in this district. He is one of the worst.” And in Iowa, he said the Republican Congress had “stuck a pitchfork in the farmer’s back.”The rest, as they say, is history.What to read tonightBiden announced he would tap the Strategic Petroleum Reserve once again, Clifford Krauss and Michael D. Shear report, in a move intended to lower gasoline prices for American consumers.A federal judge in Florida said that sections of the state’s election law were unconstitutional, the first federal court ruling striking down key parts of a major Republican voting law since the 2020 election, Reid J. Epstein and Patricia Mazzei report.According to Alan Feuer, Katie Benner and Maggie Haberman, the Justice Department has widened its investigation into the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol to encompass possible involvement of other government officials.Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, announced he would vote against the confirmation of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to the Supreme Court, Annie Karni reports.Some voters in North Carolina think Representative Madison Cawthorn has finally gone too far, Trip Gabriel reports from Cawthorn’s district.FrameworkGov. Ned Lamont of Connecticut, a Democrat who is up for re-election, released an ad that struck an upbeat tone.Jessica Hill for The New York TimesDemocrats’ two paths There’s a lot of doom and gloom across America, something Republican campaigns have leveraged to try to persuade voters to change the status quo and oust Democrats from Congress.It leaves Democrats with a tough decision: empathize with voters’ hardships or put forward a different narrative entirely?In Connecticut, Gov. Ned Lamont, a Democrat who is up for re-election this year, seems to be taking the second approach. In his first ad of the cycle, he paints a sunny picture, smiling as he strolls through suburban neighborhoods and talks with constituents. He boasts that he turned the state’s deficit into a surplus, while lowering taxes and investing in schools.“A balanced budget, lower taxes — our state is strong and getting stronger,” Lamont declares to the camera.It’s a sharp departure from a Democratic ad we highlighted last month from Senator Raphael Warnock of Georgia, in which the sun was noticeably absent. Or from another Democratic ad that Senator Mark Kelly of Arizona began running in late February that acknowledged “families are working hard to get by right now.”Governors might have a little more room to highlight state and local achievements than members of Congress. Still, by trying to prove that they’ve improved conditions since the coronavirus pandemic began, Democrats may run the risk of seeming out of touch with their constituents’ day-to-day struggles.Thanks for reading. We’ll see you tomorrow.— Blake & LeahIs there anything you think we’re missing? Anything you want to see more of? We’d love to hear from you. Email us at onpolitics@nytimes.com. More

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      Call Logs Underscore Trump’s Efforts to Sway Lawmakers on Jan. 6

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      New details from White House documents provided to the House panel investigating the Capitol assault show a 7-hour gap in records of calls made by the former president on the day of the riot.WASHINGTON — As part of his frenzied attempt to cling to power, President Donald J. Trump reached out repeatedly to members of Congress on Jan. 6 both before and during the siege of the Capitol, according to White House call logs and evidence gathered by the House committee investigating the attack.The logs, reported earlier by The Washington Post and CBS and authenticated by The New York Times, indicated that Mr. Trump had called Republican members of Congress, including Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, Senator Josh Hawley of Missouri and Representative Jim Jordan of Ohio, as he sought to pressure Vice President Mike Pence to reject electoral votes from several states.But the logs also have a large gap with no record of calls by Mr. Trump from critical hours when investigators know that he was making them. The call logs were among documents turned over by the National Archives to the House committee examining the Jan. 6 attack last year on the Capitol.The New York Times reported last month that the committee had discovered gaps in official White House telephone logs from the day of the riot. The Washington Post and CBS reported Tuesday that a gap in the phone logs amounted to seven hours and 37 minutes, including the period when the building was being assaulted.Investigators have not uncovered evidence that any of the call logs were tampered with or deleted. It is well known that Mr. Trump routinely used his personal cellphone, and those of his aides, to talk with other aides, congressional allies and outside confidants, bypassing the normal channels of presidential communication and possibly explaining why the calls were not logged.The logs appear to have captured calls that were routed through the White House switchboard. Three former officials who worked under Mr. Trump said that he mostly used the switchboard operator for outgoing calls when he was in the residence. He would occasionally use it from the Oval Office, the former officials said, but more often he would make calls through the assistants sitting outside the office, as well as from his cellphone or an aide’s cellphone. The assistants were supposed to keep records of the calls, but officials said the record-keeping was not thorough.People trying to reach Mr. Trump sometimes called the cellphone of Dan Scavino Jr., the former deputy chief of staff and omnipresent aide, one of the former officials said. (The House committee investigating the attack recommended Monday evening that Mr. Scavino be charged with criminal contempt of Congress for refusing to cooperate with a subpoena from the panel.)But the call logs nevertheless show how personally involved Mr. Trump was in his last-ditch attempt to stay in office.One of the calls made by Mr. Trump on Jan. 6, 2021 — at 9:16 a.m. — was to Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Senate’s top Republican, who refused to go along with Mr. Trump’s pressure campaign. Mr. Trump checked with the White House switchboard operator at 10:40 a.m. to make sure a message had been left for Mr. McConnell.Mr. McConnell declined to return the president’s calls, he told reporters on Tuesday.“The last time I spoke to the president was the day after the Electoral College declared President Biden the winner,” Mr. McConnell said. “I publicly congratulated President Biden on his victory and received a phone call after that from President Trump and that’s the last time we’ve spoke.”The logs also show Mr. Trump reached out on the morning of Jan. 6 to Mr. Jordan, who had been among those members of Congress organizing objections to Mr. Biden’s election on the House floor.The logs show Mr. Trump and Mr. Jordan spoke from 9:24 a.m. to 9:34 a.m. Mr. Jordan has acknowledged speaking with Mr. Trump on Jan. 6, though he has said he cannot remember how many times they spoke that day or when the calls occurred.Mr. Trump called Mr. Hawley at 9:39 a.m., and Mr. Hawley returned his phone call. A spokesman for Mr. Hawley said Tuesday that the two men did not connect and did not speak until March. Mr. Hawley had been the first senator to announce he would object to President Biden’s victory, and continued his objections even after rioters stormed the building and other senators backed off the plan.The logs also show that Mr. Trump spoke from 11:04 a.m. to 11:06 a.m. with former Senator David Perdue, Republican of Georgia, who had recently lost his re-election campaign to Senator Jon Ossoff.A spokesman for Senator Bill Hagerty, Republican of Tennessee, confirmed he had called Mr. Trump on Jan. 6 but said they did not connect. Mr. Hagerty declined to comment.Despite the lack of call records from the White House, the committee has learned that Mr. Trump spoke on the phone with other Republican lawmakers on the morning of Jan. 6.For instance, Mr. Trump mistakenly called the phone of Senator Mike Lee, Republican of Utah, thinking it was the number of Senator Tommy Tuberville, Republican of Alabama. Mr. Lee then passed the phone to Mr. Tuberville, who said he had spoken to Mr. Trump for less than 10 minutes as rioters were breaking into the building.Capitol Riot’s Aftermath: Key DevelopmentsCard 1 of 4Trump’s tweet. More

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      Why Rick Scott and Mitch McConnell Are Feuding Over Midterm Elections

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      Senator Rick Scott has an 11-point plan to “rescue America.” Senator Mitch McConnell would rather he not.Republican insiders have long worried that they could blow a golden opportunity to retake the Senate this year. And while most are confident that a red wave will still wash enough of their candidates ashore in November to win a majority, some doubt occasionally creeps in.The latest reason: an ongoing disagreement between two of the top Republicans in the Senate, Mitch McConnell, the minority leader, and Rick Scott, the leader of the party’s campaign arm. At issue is the “11-Point Plan to Rescue America” that Scott has presented as a platform for the midterms, and that McConnell has emphatically rejected.And while Scott has said that the plan is just his opinion, developed using his own campaign funds, Democrats have been all too happy to pin its provisions on the Republican Party writ large.They’ve seized on one bullet point in particular, which reads: “All Americans should pay some income tax to have skin in the game, even if a small amount. Currently over half of Americans pay no income tax.” That idea polls badly, according to Morning Consult, though other provisions of Scott’s plan are popular.On Thursday, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee paid for a truck-mounted billboard to troll Senate Republicans during their one-day retreat. “Senate Republicans’ Plan: Raise Your Taxes,” the billboard read.Never mind that McConnell has brushed back Scott, telling reporters at the Capitol last week, “We will not have as part of our agenda a bill that raises taxes on half the American people, and sunsets Social Security and Medicare within five years. That will not be part of a Republican Senate majority agenda. We will focus instead on what the American people are concerned about: inflation, energy, defense, the border and crime.”McConnell also made it clear who was in charge. “If we’re fortunate enough to have the majority next year, I’ll be the majority leader,” he said. “I’ll decide, in consultation with my members, what to put on the floor.”Scott defended himself last week in an opinion piece in The Wall Street Journal, saying his plan had “hit a nerve” with Washington elites, whom he accused of misleading voters about the sustainability of federal deficits and entitlement programs.“Part of the deception is achieved by disconnecting so many Americans from taxation,” he wrote. “It’s a genius political move. And it is bankrupting us.”Scott’s plan has some powerful backers, including the Heritage Foundation, which plans to host him for an event later this month. The think tank has long advocated “broadening the base,” the preferred term on the right for increasing the number of Americans who are subject to taxation.A Guide to the 2022 Midterm ElectionsMidterms Begin: The Texas primaries officially opened the 2022 election season. See the full primary calendar.In the Senate: Democrats have a razor-thin margin that could be upended with a single loss. Here are the four incumbents most at risk.In the House: Republicans and Democrats are seeking to gain an edge through redistricting and gerrymandering, though this year’s map is poised to be surprisingly fairGovernors’ Races: Georgia’s contest will be at the center of the political universe, but there are several important races across the country.Key Issues: Inflation, the pandemic, abortion and voting rights are expected to be among this election cycle’s defining topics.“Conservatives in this country are demanding an ambitious, conservative agenda,” said Kevin Roberts, the president of the Heritage Foundation. “Therefore, it excites us to see members talking that way.”Democrats dust off a playbookScott’s plan is a fortuitous turn of events for Chuck Schumer, the Senate majority leader, Democrats say.“Chuck, I’m sure, is salivating,” said Jim Kessler, a former Schumer aide who is now an executive vice president at Third Way, a center-left think tank.In the first sentence of a letter to his Senate colleagues this week, Schumer wrote, “As Senate Republicans debate their plan to increase taxes on millions of working Americans, Senate Democrats have focused on ways to get rising prices under control to help working families.”Senate Democrats are considering holding hearings, and possibly a series of votes, to highlight Scott’s plan and to force Republicans to take uncomfortable positions on it.It’s a playbook that Schumer has run before. In 1995, as a member of the House representing New York, he used Newt Gingrich’s “Contract with America” to accuse Republicans of trying to force cuts in popular spending programs. Gingrich, who became the speaker of the House in 1995 — either because or despite that plan, depending on whom you ask — has embraced Scott’s platform.“That was probably the first thing that Chuck did that showed him as a national political leader,” recalled Kessler. With Scott’s plan, he said of Schumer, “I’m sure he sees it and says to himself, ‘I’ve taken this apart before.’”Privately, Democrats are realistic about their chances of hanging onto the Senate, and say they must seize the “gift” Scott has given them to force Republicans onto the defensive. On the day of the State of the Union, for instance, Senate Democrats ran an ad accusing McConnell of fighting “for the same wealthy insiders who get rich by keeping prices high.”During their own retreat on Wednesday, Democrats heard a presentation by Geoff Garin, a pollster, that impressed many of the senators present. Garin’s surveys have found that more voters blame the coronavirus pandemic, “China and foreign supply chains” and “large corporations raising prices to increase their profits” than they do President Biden for inflation.“The bottom line here is that Democrats have a very strong case to prosecute on rising costs,” Garin said.Republicans see the attack on Scott as a desperation play in what could be a difficult election for Senate Democrats, who must defend incumbents in Arizona, Georgia, Nevada and New Hampshire while trying to pick up seats in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.“If I were them, I would try to use it, too,” said Justin Sayfie, a Republican consultant who runs an influential Florida political news website. “But they’re going to have to put a lot of money behind it. How much penetration are they going to be able to get with a message about Rick Scott?”Two visions of how to winMcConnell and Scott have a fundamental difference of opinion about how to win the Senate, people who have studied both men say.There’s McConnell, the calculating insider, who is leery of putting forward a political agenda that could open Republicans up to Democrats’ attacks. Republicans have long memories of how, in past election cycles, Democrats have had success in accusing them of wanting to cut popular programs like Medicare and Social Security.“McConnell hates variables,” said Kessler, the former Schumer aide. “He’s like a boxer who likes to cut off the sides of the ring.”In January, when a reporter asked McConnell what his agenda might be if Republicans retake the majority, he replied simply: “That is a very good question. And I’ll let you know when we take it back.”Then there’s Scott, the ambitious outsider, a former businessman whose presidential aspirations are no secret. He’s rankled some of his fellow Republican senators by taking broad swipes at Washington — despite leading the committee in charge of electing more of them.And while they share the same goal of winning back the Senate, aides and allies of both men have sniped at one another through the press, particularly over their relationship with Donald Trump.Scott has cultivated a relationship with the former president — he made sure to send copies of his plan to Mar-a-Lago — while McConnell at times has condemned Trump, who in turn refers to the Senate minority leader as “the Old Crow.” Trump has even tried to recruit Scott as a future majority leader, according to a Politico account.McConnell’s office declined to comment.“There will always be critics, but we don’t waste much time worrying about the opinions of Democrat operatives or anonymous Washington consultants,” said Chris Hartline, the communications director for the National Republican Senatorial Committee, which Scott chairs. Asked what the Heritage Foundation would say to Senate leaders like McConnell, Roberts said, “We’re grateful for their service, and we’re looking forward to them embracing Senator Scott’s plan or coming up with a plan of their own.”What to read The U.S. Census Bureau says the 2020 census seriously undercounted the number of Hispanic, Black and Native American residents, even though its overall population count of 323.2 million was largely accurate, Michael Wines and Maria Cramer report.In February, the Consumer Price Index rose at its fastest pace in 40 years. Biden blamed Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, for the increase, though inflation has been a problem for months, Jeanna Smialek reports.As oil prices rise, many governments are working to boost global production, potentially neglecting longer-term efforts to cut use of fossil fuels to fight climate change. Brad Plumer, Lisa Friedman and David Gelles report.postcardVice President Kamala Harris called for an investigation into potential war crimes by the Russian military, during a visit to Poland on Thursday.Andrzej Lange/EPA, via ShutterstockTwo V.P.s, one message for UkraineThe world got a glimpse of two potential future presidents today, in what we’re told was a sheer coincidence.Vice President Kamala Harris was visiting Poland, where she met with the country’s leaders, called for an investigation into potential war crimes by the Russian military, held a round-table event with displaced survivors from the war in Ukraine and appeared with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of Canada in a show of Western solidarity.It so happened that her predecessor, Mike Pence, was in Ukraine on the same day as Harris’s trip. Along with his wife, Karen, he met with some of the refugees who are living in camps near the border with Poland. As Pence noted on Twitter, more than 2 million Ukrainians have fled the country over the last 12 days, according to U.N. figures.Pence’s trip comes as the former vice president tries to establish himself as a leader of the Republican Party on foreign policy ahead of a possible 2024 run. Last week, Pence blasted unnamed people in the party who, he said, were “apologists for Putin,” the Russian leader.Our colleague, Zolan Kanno-Youngs, a White House correspondent, was traveling with Harris and sending dispatches from Poland all day long. According to a background briefing by an unnamed senior administration official, he reported, teams for the former vice president and the current vice president were “not in contact.”Thanks for reading. We’ll see you tomorrow.— Blake & LeahIs there anything you think we’re missing? Anything you want to see more of? We’d love to hear from you. Email us at onpolitics@nytimes.com. More

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      Republicans Wrongly Blame Biden for Rising Gas Prices

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      They have pointed to the Biden administration’s policies on the Keystone XL pipeline and certain oil and gas leases, which have had little impact on prices.WASHINGTON — As gas prices hit a high this week, top Republican lawmakers took to the airwaves and the floors of Congress with misleading claims that pinned the blame on President Biden and his energy policies.Mr. Biden warned that his ban on imports of Russian oil, gas and coal, announced on Tuesday as a response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, would cause gas prices to rise further. High costs are expected to last as long as the confrontation does.While Republican lawmakers supported the ban, they asserted that the pain at the pump long preceded the war in Ukraine. Gas price hikes, they said, were the result of Mr. Biden’s cancellation of the Keystone XL pipeline, the temporary halt on new drilling leases on public lands and the surrendering of “energy independence” — all incorrect assertions.Here’s a fact check of their claims.What Was Said“This administration wants to ramp up energy imports from Iran and Venezuela. That is the world’s largest state sponsor of terror and a thuggish South America dictator, respectively. They would rather buy from these people than buy from Texas, Alaska and Pennsylvania.”— Senator Mitch McConnell, Republican of Kentucky and the minority leader, in a speech on Tuesday“Democrats want to blame surging prices on Russia. But the truth is, their out-of-touch policies are why we are here in the first place. Remember what happened on Day 1 with one-party rule? The president canceled the Keystone pipeline, and then he stopped new oil and gas leases on federal lands and waters.”— Representative Kevin McCarthy, Republican of California and the minority leader, in a speech on Tuesday“In the four years of the Trump-Pence administration, we achieved energy independence for the first time in 70 years. We were a net exporter of energy. But from very early on, with killing the Keystone pipeline, taking federal lands off the list for exploration, sidelining leases for oil and natural gas — once again, before Ukraine ever happened, we saw rising gasoline prices.”— Former Vice President Mike Pence in an interview on Fox Business on TuesdayThese claims are misleading. The primary reason for rising gas prices over the past year is the coronavirus pandemic and its disruptions to global supply and demand.“Covid changed the game, not President Biden,” said Patrick De Haan, the head of petroleum analysis for GasBuddy, which tracks gasoline prices. “U.S. oil production fell in the last eight months of President Trump’s tenure. Is that his fault? No.”“The pandemic brought us to our knees,” Mr. De Haan added.In the early months of 2020, when the virus took hold, demand for oil dried up and prices plummeted, with the benchmark price for crude oil in the United States falling to negative $37.63 that April. In response, producers in the United States and around the world began decreasing output.As pandemic restrictions loosened worldwide and economies recovered, demand outpaced supply. That was “mostly attributable” to the decision by OPEC Plus, an alliance of oil-producing countries that controls about half the world’s supply, to limit increases in production, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Domestic production also remains below prepandemic levels, as capital spending declined and investors remained reluctant to provide financing to the oil industry.Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has only compounded the issues.“When you throw a war on top of this, this is possibly the worst escalation you can have of this,” said Abhiram Rajendran, the head of oil market research at Energy Intelligence, an energy information company. “You’re literally pouring gasoline on general inflationary pressure.”These factors are largely out of Mr. Biden’s control, experts agreed, though they said he had not exactly sent positive signals to the oil and gas industry and its investors by vowing to reduce emissions and fossil fuel reliance.Mr. De Haan said the Biden administration was “clearly less friendly” to the industry, which may have indirectly affected investor attitudes. But overall, he said, that stance has played a “very, very small role pushing gas prices up.”President Biden announced a ban on imports of Russian oil in response to the country’s invasion of Ukraine.Tom Brenner for The New York TimesMr. Rajendran said the Biden administration had emphasized climate change issues while paying lip service to energy security.“There has been a pretty stark miscalculation of the amount of supply we would need to keep energy prices at affordable levels,” he said. “It was taken for granted. There was too much focus on the energy transition.”But presidents, Mr. Rajendran said, “have very little impact on short-term supply.”“The key relationship to watch is between companies and investors,” he said.It is true that the Biden administration is in talks with Venezuela and Iran over their oil supplies. But the administration is also urging American companies to ramp up production — to the dismay of climate change activists and contrary to Republican lawmakers’ suggestions that the White House is intent on handcuffing domestic producers.Speaking before the National Petroleum Council in December, Jennifer M. Granholm, the energy secretary, told oil companies to “please take advantage of the leases that you have, hire workers, get your rig count up.”Understand Rising Gas Prices in the U.S.Card 1 of 5A steady rise. More

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      Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey Confirms He Will Not Run for Senate

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      Senator Mitch McConnell had been trying to recruit Gov. Doug Ducey of Arizona to run, but former President Donald J. Trump had warned him against it.Gov. Doug Ducey of Arizona reaffirmed his decision Thursday not to run for the Senate this year, dealing a blow to Mitch McConnell, the Senate minority leader, while delighting former President Donald J. Trump, who for months had warned Mr. Ducey to stay out of the race.Mr. Ducey, who is term-limited as governor, was one of the most sought-after Republicans that Mr. McConnell had been trying to recruit. In a letter to donors, Mr. Ducey seemed to allude to Mr. Trump’s hectoring, saying: “These days, if you’re going to run for public office, you have to really want the job.”Angry that Mr. Ducey would not overturn Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s narrow 2020 victory in the state, Mr. Trump has rampaged for over a year, complaining about Mr. Ducey’s certification of the electoral results and threatening him about the Senate race.“Right now I have the job I want,” Mr. Ducey wrote, “and my intention is to close my years of service to Arizona with a very productive final legislative session and to help elect Republican governors across the country in my role as chairman of the Republican Governors Association.”Mr. Ducey’s decision was long expected. For months, he had told both reporters pressing him and Republicans courting him that he had little appetite to challenge Senator Mark Kelly, a first-term Democrat.A Guide to the 2022 Midterm ElectionsMidterms Begin: The Texas primaries officially opened the 2022 election season. See the full primary calendar.In the Senate: Democrats have a razor-thin margin that could be upended with a single loss. Here are the four incumbents most at risk.In the House: Republicans and Democrats are seeking to gain an edge through redistricting and gerrymandering.Governors’ Races: Georgia’s contest will be at the center of the political universe, but there are several important races across the country.Key Issues: Inflation, the pandemic, abortion and voting rights are expected to be among this election cycle’s defining topics.That did not stop Mr. McConnell, whose attempts to recruit two other Republican governors, Chris Sununu of New Hampshire and Larry Hogan of Maryland, into Senate races were also rebuffed.Taken together, the rejections illustrate the difficulty Senate Republicans are having in trying to lure mainstream conservative governors to serve in a party still shadowed by Mr. Trump and in a polarized capital that can offer less policymaking opportunity than statehouses. Moreover, many of the state executives are more interested in the presidency than the Senate.“By nature and by training I’m an executive,” wrote Mr. Ducey, who in an interview last month mused that senators seem only to “tweet all day, do a 5 p.m. news hit and go out for the rest of the night.”His candidacy, which would have tested Mr. Trump’s influence in a pivotal state, effectively hands Mr. Trump a victory without contest, the sort of win the former president’s intraparty antagonists are hoping to deny in a series of primaries this year.Given President Biden’s declining approval ratings and Arizona’s center-right tilt, Republicans might still be able to reclaim Mr. Kelly’s seat, which was previously held by Senator John McCain.It’s not clear which of the Republicans in the remaining field would be best-positioned to defeat Mr. Kelly, who began the year with $18 million in campaign cash. Attorney General Mark Brnovich has led a handful of lesser-known Republicans in some polls ahead of the August primary, but the race has been frozen as G.O.P. officials implored Mr. Ducey to run.A parade of prominent Republican leaders, including former President George W. Bush and Karl Rove as well as Mr. McConnell and his lieutenants, lobbied the Arizona governor, some sharing polling that indicated Mr. Trump’s declining influence in primaries.Gov. Doug Ducey with former President Donald J. Trump in 2020. Mr. Trump has complained about Mr. Ducey’s certification of Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s narrow victory in the state.Doug Mills/The New York TimesThe array of anti-Trump Republicans believed Mr. Ducey, a popular two-term governor and former chief of Cold Stone Creamery, would be their party’s strongest candidate and would also send a message about what they believe is Mr. Trump’s diminishing clout.“MAGA will never accept RINO Governor Doug Ducey of Arizona running for the U.S. Senate,” Mr. Trump said in a statement last month after a Times article detailed the wooing of the governor. “So save your time, money, and energy, Mitch!”In Mr. Ducey’s letter on Thursday, which was first reported by The Arizona Republic, he made no direct mention of Mr. Trump. But the governor did make a point to single out Mr. McConnell, who had been his most ardent pursuer.“The only downside about any of this is that it would be an honor to serve with Senator Mitch McConnell,” he wrote. “I consider him an historic figure and one of the Titans of the Senate, and I am supportive of everything he’s doing to elect Republican senators and wrest back control from Chuck Schumer.”Mr. Ducey, who became close to Mr. McConnell when the two collaborated on who would be appointed to fill Mr. McCain’s seat after his death in 2018, also indicated in the letter that he was considering “perhaps weighing in” with an endorsement in the Senate primary.For his part, Mr. Trump has not formally intervened in the primary — at least not in support of a candidate. More

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      How McConnell Hopes to Thwart Trump in the Midterms

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      Senator Mitch McConnell is working furiously to bring allies to Washington who will buck Donald J. Trump. It’s not going according to plan.PHOENIX — For more than a year, former President Donald Trump has berated Gov. Doug Ducey of Arizona, savaging him for refusing to overturn the state’s presidential results and vowing to oppose him should he run for the Senate this year.In early December, though, Mr. Ducey received a far friendlier message from another former Republican president. At a golf tournament luncheon, George W. Bush encouraged him to run against Senator Mark Kelly, a Democrat, suggesting the Republican Party needs more figures like Mr. Ducey to step forward.“It’s something you have to feel a certain sense of humility about,” the governor said this month of Mr. Bush’s appeal. “You listen respectfully, and that’s what I did.”Mr. Bush and a band of anti-Trump Republicans led by Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky are hoping he does more than listen.As Mr. Trump works to retain his hold on the Republican Party, elevating a slate of friendly candidates in midterm elections, Mr. McConnell and his allies are quietly, desperately maneuvering to try to thwart him. The loose alliance, which was once thought of as the G.O.P. establishment, for months has been engaged in a high-stakes candidate recruitment campaign, full of phone calls, meetings, polling memos and promises of millions of dollars. It’s all aimed at recapturing the Senate majority, but the election also represents what could be Republicans’ last chance to reverse the spread of Trumpism before it fully consumes their party.Mr. McConnell for years pushed Mr. Trump’s agenda and only rarely opposed him in public. But the message that he delivers privately now is unsparing, if debatable: Mr. Trump is losing political altitude and need not be feared in a primary, he has told Mr. Ducey in repeated phone calls, as the Senate leader’s lieutenants share polling data they argue proves it.In conversations with senators and would-be senators, Mr. McConnell is blunt about the damage he believes Mr. Trump has done to the G.O.P., according to those who have spoken to him. Privately, he has declared he won’t let unelectable “goofballs” win Republican primaries.History doesn’t bode well for such behind-the-scene efforts to challenge Mr. Trump, and Mr. McConnell’s hard sell is so far yielding mixed results. The former president has rallied behind fewer far-right candidates than initially feared by the party’s old guard. Yet a handful of formidable contenders have spurned Mr. McConnell’s entreaties, declining to subject themselves to Mr. Trump’s wrath all for the chance to head to a bitterly divided Washington.Last week, Gov. Larry Hogan of Maryland announced he would not run for Senate, despite a pressure campaign that involved his wife. Mr. Ducey is expected to make a final decision soon, but he has repeatedly said he has little appetite for a bid.Mr. Trump, however, has also had setbacks. He’s made a handful of endorsements in contentious races, but his choices have not cleared the Republican field, and one has dropped out.How Donald J. Trump Still LoomsGrip on G.O.P.: Mr. Trump remains the most powerful figure in the Republican Party. However, there are signs his control is loosening.Trump vs. DeSantis: Tensions between the ex-president and Florida governor show the challenge confronting the G.O.P. in 2022.Midterms Effect: Mr. Trump has become a party kingmaker, but his involvement in state races worries many Republicans.Just the Beginning: For many Trump supporters who marched on Jan. 6, the day was not a disgraced insurrection but the start of a movement.If Mr. Trump muscles his preferred candidates through primaries and the general election this year, it will leave little doubt of his control of the Republican Party, build momentum for another White House bid and entrench his brand of politics in another generation of Republican leaders.If he loses in a series of races after an attempt to play kingmaker, however, it would deflate Mr. Trump’s standing, luring other ambitious Republicans into the White House contest and providing a path for the party to move on.“No one should be afraid of President Trump, period,” said Senator Susan Collins of Maine, who won in 2020 without endorsing the then-president and has worked with Mr. McConnell to try to woo anti-Trump candidates.While there is some evidence that Mr. Trump’s grip on Republican voters has eased, polls show the former president remains overwhelmingly popular in the party. Among politicians trying to win primaries, no other figure’s support is more ardently sought.“In my state, he’s still looked at as the leader of the party,” Senator Josh Hawley of Missouri said.The proxy war isn’t just playing out in Senate races.Mr. Trump is backing primary opponents to incumbent governors in Georgia and Idaho, encouraged an ally to take on the Alabama governor and helped drive Gov. Charlie Baker of Massachusetts into retirement by supporting a rival. The Republican Governors Association, which Mr. Ducey leads, this week began pushing back, airing a television commercial defending the Georgia governor, Brian Kemp, against his opponent, former Senator David Perdue. It was the first time in the group’s history they’ve financed ads for an incumbent battling a primary.“Trump has got a lot of chips on the board,” said Bill Haslam, the former Tennessee governor.Mr. McConnell has been careful in picking his moments to push back against the former president. Last week, he denounced a Republican National Committee resolution orchestrated by Mr. Trump’s allies that censured two House Republican Trump critics.As the former president heckles the soon-to-be 80-year-old Kentuckian as an “Old Crow,” Mr. McConnell’s response has been to embrace the moniker: Last week, he sent an invitation for a reception in which donors who hand over $5,000 checks can take home bottles of the Kentucky-made Old Crow brand bourbon signed by the senator.Mr. McConnell has been loath to discuss his recruitment campaign and even less forthcoming about his rivalry with Mr. Trump. In an interview last week, he warded off questions about their conflict, avoiding mentioning Mr. Trump’s name even when it was obvious to whom he was referring.If Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, who is an outspoken Trump antagonist running for Senate this fall, wins her primary, it will show that “endorsements from some people didn’t determine the outcome,” he said.Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska at the Capitol last week. Senator Mitch McConnell and Mr. Trump are at odds over her reelection bid.Sarahbeth Maney/The New York TimesMs. Murkowski appears well-positioned at the moment, with over $4 million on hand while her Trump-backed rival, Kelly Tshibaka, has $630,000.“He’s made very clear that you’ve been there for Alaska, you’ve been there for the team and I’m going to be there for you,” Ms. Murkowski said of Mr. McConnell’s message to her.Even more pointedly, Mr. McConnell vowed that if Senator John Thune of South Dakota, the second-ranking Senate Republican, faces the primary that Mr. Trump once promised, Mr. Thune “will crush whoever runs against him.” (The most threatening candidate, Gov. Kristi Noem, has declined.)The Senate Republican leader has been worried that Mr. Trump will tap candidates too weak to win in the general election, the sort of nominees who cost the party control of the Senate in 2010 and 2012.“We changed the business model in 2014, and have not had one of these goofballs nominated since,” he told a group of donors on a private conference call last year, according to a recording obtained by The New York Times.Mr. McConnell has sometimes decided to pick his battles — in Georgia, he acceded to Herschel Walker, a former football star and Trump-backed candidate, after failing to recruit Mr. Perdue to rejoin the Senate. He also came up empty-handed in New Hampshire, where Gov. Chris Sununu passed on a bid after an aggressive campaign that also included lobbying from Mr. Bush.In Maryland, Mr. Hogan was plainly taken with the all-out push to recruit him, although he declined to take on Senator Chris Van Hollen, a Democrat.“Elaine Chao was working over my wife,” Mr. Hogan recalled of a lunch, first reported by The Associated Press, between Ms. Chao, the former cabinet secretary and wife of Mr. McConnell, and Maryland’s first lady, Yumi Hogan. “Her argument was, ‘You can really be a voice.’”Gov. Larry Hogan of Maryland, left, with Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland in Baltimore. Mr. McConnell has tried to recruit Mr. Hogan as a Senate candidate.Al Drago for The New York TimesMr. McConnell also dispatched Ms. Collins and Senator Mitt Romney of Utah to lobby Mr. Hogan. That campaign culminated last weekend, when Mr. Romney called Mr. Hogan to vent about the R.N.C.’s censure, tell him Senate Republicans needed anti-Trump reinforcements and argue that Mr. Hogan could have more of a platform in his effort to remake the party as a sitting senator rather than an ex-governor.“I’m very interested in changing the party and that was the most effective argument,” said Mr. Hogan, who is believed to be considering a bid for the White House.Mr. Romney lamented Mr. Hogan’s decision and expressed frustration. He claimed most party leaders share their view of the former president, but few will voice it in public.“I don’t see new people standing up and saying, ‘I’m going to do something here which may be politically unpopular’ — in public at least,” Mr. Romney said.At Mar-a-Lago, courtship of the former president’s endorsement has been so intense, and his temptation to pick favorites so alluring, that he regrets getting involved in some races too soon, according to three Republican officials who’ve spoken to him.In Pennsylvania’s open Senate race, Mr. Trump backed Sean Parnell, who withdrew after a bitter custody battle with his estranged wife. And in Alabama, the former president rallied to Representative Mo Brooks to succeed Senator Richard Shelby, who’s retiring. But Mr. Brooks, who attended the rally that preceded the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol, is struggling to gain traction.One Republican strategist who has visited with Mr. Trump said the former president was increasingly suspicious of the consultants and donors beseeching him.“He has become more judicious so not everybody who runs down to Mar-a-Lago for the weekend gets endorsed on Monday,” said Senator Kevin Cramer of North Dakota, another Trump ally.Mr. Trump has made clear he wants the Senate candidates he backs to oust Mr. McConnell from his leadership perch, and even considered making a pledge to do so a condition of his endorsement. Few have done so to date, a fact Mr. McConnell considers a victory. “Only two of them have taken me on,” he crowed, alluding to Ms. Tshibaka in Alaska, and Eric Greitens, the former Missouri governor running for an open seat.But Mr. McConnell’s biggest get yet would be Mr. Ducey.Mr. Trump, right, has supported Representative Mo Brooks’s run for a Senate seat in Alabama.Chip Somodevilla/Getty ImagesWith broad popularity and three statewide victories to his name, the term-limited governor and former ice cream chain executive would be a strong candidate against Mr. Kelly, who has nearly $19 million in the bank — more than double the combined sum of the existing Republican field.To some of the state’s Republicans, Mr. Ducey could send a critical message in a swing state. “It would say we’re getting tired of this,” said Rusty Bowers, speaker of the Arizona State House, who encouraged Mr. Ducey to stand up to Mr. Trump’s “bully caucus.”Mr. Ducey also has been lobbied by the G.O.P. strategist Karl Rove, the liaison to Mr. Bush, who sought to reassure the governor that he could win.Mr. Ducey said he believed that this year’s “primaries are going to determine the future of the party.” However, he sounded much like Mr. Hogan and Mr. Sununu when asked about his enthusiasm for jumping into another campaign.“This is the job I’ve wanted,” he said.He noted there was one prominent member of the Trump administration, though, who has been supportive. Former Vice President Mike Pence “encouraged me to stay in the fight,” Mr. Ducey said. More