McCaskill blasts 'too many embarrassing uncles' in Senate, in final floor speech

Sen. Claire McCaskill of Missouri, seen here in September, voiced her complaints on the Senate floor. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson, File)

Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill criticized the Senate in a grim farewell speech Thursday, calling it "dysfunctional" and filled with “too many embarrassing uncles.”

The two-term senator from Missouri delivered a farewell speech after she lost her re-election bid in November to the state’s Republican Attorney General Josh Hawley. She questioned the abilities of the Senate, adding she feared for its future: “It just doesn’t work as well as it used to.”

“The United States Senate is no longer the world’s greatest deliberative body and everybody needs to quit saying it until we recover from this period of polarization and the fear of the political consequences of tough votes,” McCaskill said.

She also took aim at her colleagues.

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“Peter Morgan, an author, wrote that no family is complete without an embarrassing uncle. We have too many embarrassing uncles in the United States Senate.”

She added that in her time as a lawmaker, she learned that “it puts the 'fun' in dysfunctional.”

Other senators delivering farewell speeches this week included Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., and Bill Nelson, D-Fla.