Kentucky GOP leaders are teeing up their lines of attack on SCOTUS nominee, Ukraine response

While McConnell did split with some GOP colleagues by embracing Biden’s pledge to nominate a Black woman to the high court, the powerful senator is describing the eventual nominee, Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, as the favored choice of “far-left dark-money groups” that he says have attacked the legitimacy and structure of the court. It's a move McConnell argues runs counter to Biden’s campaign themes.

"President Biden was elected on a specific promise to govern from the middle," the legislator said after the announcement of the retirement of Justice Stephen Breyer.

Another avenue of attack McConnell is Jackson’s limited number of published opinions since taking her current seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit last year, along with the reversal of one of her prior rulings.

But in a Historical Society of the District of Columbia Circuit event, Jackson described her process as detail-oriented.

McConnell voted against promoting Jackson to her current post, so it’s unlikely the leader would supply a vote to elevate Biden’s choice to the country's highest court, but he has promised a “fair look” at the pick.

Meanwhile, Kentucky Republican leaders are decrying Biden’s sanctions against Russia as lukewarm and unlikely to “get the job done," in the wake of President Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine. McConnell is labeling the sanctions as “tepid” and calling on the administration to ratchet up its efforts to punish Russia’s economy.

Fellow Republican, Rep. Andy Barr, went further in his criticism, claiming Biden’s “weak and feckless foreign policy” invited the invasion of Ukraine.

While Biden unleashed a series of sanctions and restrictions targeting Russian banks and imposing import controls, the president has been more hesitant to target Russia’s oil and gas sector, expressing concerns about how the move might impact fuel costs in the U.S. and Europe.