“The rift between Capitol Hill’s two top Republicans over Jan. 6 continues to widen, with one leader signaling openness toward leaving Donald Trump behind and pursuing accountability for the Capitol insurrection, and the other embracing the former president and his fact-free reality as tightly as ever. On Tuesday, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) announced he would oppose legislation to create an independent, bipartisan commission to fully investigate the Capitol attack, even though the deal creating this commission was four months in the making and brokered by a House GOP committee leader. But just a few hours later, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) didn’t rule out supporting the commission, saying his conference would have to weigh the arguments and read the ‘fine print’ of the deal. ‘We are undecided about the way forward at this point,’ he said at a press conference.”

“That, of course, doesn’t mean McConnell will support the bill creating the panel that passes out of the House over McCarthy’s objections. It’s just that, as McConnell often does, he’s left himself political room to make that decision. He said Tuesday that he’s ‘pushing the pause button’ and is ‘willing to listen’ to arguments about ‘whether such a commission is needed.’ For months, it’s been clear that the GOP’s House and Senate leaders have diverged on Donald Trump, both on his role in fomenting Jan. 6 and on what his role should be in defining the GOP going forward. But the daylight between McConnell and McCarthy on the fate of a high-profile commission – one that figures to keep the insurrection front-and-center and possibly unearth damaging new information about the GOP’s de facto leader – could further fuel divisions in the party” – Daily Beast.