Scoop: Kentucky Governor Reportedly Close to Replacing McConnell

Governor Andy Beshear is working behind the scenes to learn the truth about Mitch McConnell, and may take action in the coming days

Reuters/Tom Brenner/File Photo

When Mitch McConnell first ran for Senate from the Commonwealth of Kentucky in 1984, he won the campaign with one commercial produced by Roger Ailes.

McConnell at the time was a malleable young man. According to the ad’s producers, McConnell would embrace anything to win. The idea was an ad that had an actor playing Senator Dee Huddleston (D-Ky.) running from a wild-haired Kentucky farmer armed with a couple of relentless bloodhounds.

The commercial accused Huddleston of being AWOL from the Senate, taking payoffs, dodging votes and screwing over the “common folk” in the Commonwealth of Kentucky.

“My job is to find Dee Huddleston and get him back to work,” the voiceover declared.

Today, many across both Kentucky and the United States are saying the same thing about McConnell, who hasn’t cast a vote in the Senate since June 11, 2026.

Former Senate Staffer Says McConnell ‘Clearly Incapacitated’

“If I were the governor of Kentucky, I would announce I’m going to appoint a Democrat to his seat unless they produce him,” former Republican National Committee spokesperson Cheri Jacobus told Raw America White House reporter Brian Karem. “Make them produce McConnell. Everyone thinks he’s dead.”

Not everyone thinks McConnell has passed. Joel Rubin, a former Senate staffer who also worked under Democratic and Republican presidents, said Washington is abuzz with speculation — and no proof.

“He’s clearly incapacitated,” Rubin told Raw America. “And his being absent without any explanation undermines the stability of our government and nation, and McConnell isn’t the first to do it.”

Even high-ranking office holders in Kentucky on both sides of the political aisle are concerned. Kentucky’s two-term Democratic Governor Andy Beshear told Katie Couric last week: “I’d gotten two calls from different agencies, not state agencies, suggesting that he’d passed.

Since then, McConnell produced two pictures in a hospital setting. One featured him in bed with his wife, Elaine Chao, sitting in a chair next to him. The second one had him standing next to a man who appeared to be taking a selfie. In both cases, McConnell was wearing what appeared to be the same red-and-white checkered button-down shirt. Both photos led to speculation that McConnell’s office was using AI to generate deepfakes of the 84 year-old senator.

“This is time for bold leadership,” Jacobus said. “People are demanding that Beshear do something.”

The governor’s office has not returned repeated phone calls from Raw America asking about his next steps, though Beshear said in July that it was time for McConnell to step up and address the issue. He's recently told reporters he’d consider exercising the “nuclear option” by naming someone to replace McConnell and forcing the issue.

McConnell’s hometown newspaper, the Louisville Courier-Journal, upped the pressure by publishing a pre-obituary on McConnell by opinion columnist Joe Gerth. The author wrote he understood McConnell was recovering from an illness but wanted to make sure to criticize him while he was still alive so he couldn’t be accused of speaking ill of the dead, as some of the late Sen. Lindsey Graham’s (R-S.C.) critics were following his recent unexpected death at age 71.

Beshear Reportedly Planning Major Announcement

Whether McConnell is still alive or not remains up for debate given the lack of any public statement, video or phone call from the Kentucky senator. But the threat by Gov. Beshear to appoint someone to McConnell’s seat ahead of the November general election has become the biggest hot-button issue in both Kentucky and Washington.

“Kentucky hasn’t fared well in Supreme Court challenges recently, so if the governor did that he might be successful,” one longtime Beshear advisor told Raw America. “At this point, what does anyone have to lose? McConnell isn’t showing up anywhere.”

But according to a well-known Democrat in Kentucky, McConnell actually showing his face would be “hard to do if you’re dead, in a coma or can’t speak.”

“Honestly, if Beshear wanted to seize this issue, he’d make a commercial mimicking the hit job McConnell did to Dee Huddleston back in 1984,” the Democrat added. “It would go viral.”

At the end of the infamous Ailes-produced 1984 commercial, the narrator urged everyone to “Switch to Mitch.” But in more recent elections, Kentuckians have embraced the slogan “Ditch Mitch.”

The biggest obstacle for Beshear is that the Kentucky General Assembly passed legislation preventing the governor from appoint a successor. Instead, he can only call for a special election. Many Kentuckians worry that because of time constraints, there won’t be enough time to conduct a special election if nothing is done by August 3.

“Beshear might surprise us any day with an ‘important’ message about Mitch,” one current officeholder in Kentucky told Raw America on background.

The term-limited governor is facing backlash from Democrats for not being more aggressive on replacing McConnell. One source close to Beshear told Raw America that while the governor understands the urgency, “a lot of the pressure is coming from outside of the state and the governor isn’t going to be moved until he’s ready to move.”

That source added Beshear may act as soon as “this weekend,” but that the governor “wants to give McConnell the chance to come forward first with any pertinent information — if he can.”

However, the governor is also being careful not to get ahead of his skis and then have to later retract a statement made about Sen. McConnell’s condition.

“That’s where a lot of politicians fail,” Jacobus said. “The best remember they are there for the public good.”

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The hospitalization of Mitch McConnell — the former Senate majority leader and key architect of the far-right Roberts Court — has proven to be one of the biggest ongoing mysteries in politics. When his team refused to give the American public any updates about the longtime senator’s capacity to serve, Raw America White House reporter Brian Karem immediately got to work calling his sources in both Kentucky and Washington. Brian brings decades of experience to Raw America, and a career of carefully cultivated sources deep within the halls of government so we can get you the stories the billionaire-owned media outlets won’t touch.

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