Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell wants a mulligan on his failure to convict Donald Trump earlier this year during his second impeachment trial. McConnell's fumble is undoubtedly responsible for breathing new life into Trump, who has now overwhelmed the party McConnell fancifully imagined was under his command.  

On Tuesday, McConnell was asked by CNN's Manu Raju if he is "concerned at all" about the Republican Party embracing Trump, who McConnell once said was morally responsible for the Jan. 6 attack. McConnell's dodgy answer boiled down to "yes" as he painted a picture of the GOP midterm message that could have been absent Trump.

"I do think we need to be thinking about the future and not the past," McConnell responded, obviously lamenting Trump's obsession with his 2020 election loss. "I think the American people are focusing on this administration, what it's doing to the country, and it's my hope the '22 election will be a referendum on the performance of the current administration, not a rehash of suggestions about what may have happened in 2020."

Good luck with that, Senator. Whatever the American people might be focusing on, most GOP voters are shoveling down a daily diet of grievance about the 2020 election supposedly being stolen despite lacking a shred of evidence to support their claims.

If McConnell had an ounce of grit, he wouldn't even open the door of conjecture about "what may have happened in 2020." But over and over, McConnell has proven he doesn't have the fortitude to slam that door shut—which is exactly what has landed the Republican Party in Trump's factless alternate reality.  

For months, Senate Republicans—particularly those responsible for winning back the Senate majority—have been trying and failing to tell political reporters about their supposedly forward-looking message for 2022. But instead, Trump's 800 pounds of deadweight keeps the GOP anchored and awash in his self-obsessed grievances about being a literal loser last November.

Trump can't handle the truth, and Senate Republicans like McConnell are too spineless to tell it.

So whatever McConnell may "hope" for 2022, it's a pipe dream precisely because he doesn't have the mettle to set the record straight.