That hissing sound heard all over Washington, D.C., recently was the air escaping from the MAGA 2024 balloon after Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell delivered an unmistakable message to his party that it’s time to separate its future and fortunes from those of ex-president Donald Trump.

Describing the Jab. 6, 2021, assault on the Capitol as “a violent insurrection” by a mob of Trump loyalists determined to overturn the presidential election outcome, McConnell made the clean break from Trump that many in the party hoped for.

After enduring and ignoring Trump’s coarse and abusive remarks addressed at him for months, McConnell spied his opening when the Republican National Committee ,in an unfathomable act of self-immolation, defended the Jan. 6 rioters as engaging in “legitimate political discourse.”

Recognizing this was his moment, McConnell pounced: “We saw it happen. It was a violent insurrection for the purpose of trying to prevent the peaceful transfer of power after a legitimately certified election from one administration to the next.”

In thirty-two words, McConnell rejected Trump’s promise to pardon any rioters should they be convicted and drove a stake through the former president’s evidence-free claims that the election was stolen from him.

A cannier politician than Trump could ever aspire to be and who is far superior at “reading the room” – judging the mood of the electorate – McConnell understood the peril to Republican candidates in the midterm congressional elections if they stood silently while the ex-president controlled a narrative that was untenable and strategically unsound.

The National Committee’s censure of two House members – Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Adam Kinzinger of Illinois – for serving on the committee investigating the Jan. 6 riot and also produced backlash from a number of congressional Republicans, who were aghast at its damaging impact.

But it was McConnell’s blunt comments and the implicit warning they conveyed to the party that were far more telling. His public call for putting distance between them and Trump may have been overdue, but it is now on the record – running as a member of the cult of Trump foreshadowed disaster and jeopardized regaining control of Congress for the first time since 2014.

But it was the three words – “legitimate political discourse” – that overshadowed all else, including the censure of two sitting members of the House.

Tens of millions of Americans watched – transfixed and horrified – as a howling mob smashed doors and windows, assaulted and fought with police, broke into offices, stole personal property, and sent members of Congress fleeing to safety.

The American people did not see legitimate political discourse. Rather, they saw the unthinkable – fellow countrymen descending on the nation’s symbol of democracy, vandalizing it while demanding a free and fair election be overturned.

It was the stuff of dictatorial governments determined to cling to power at any cost. It couldn’t happen here. Until it did.

Democratic congressional candidates will use the legitimate political discourse language as a blunt instrument to pummel their GOP opponents and demand they either condemn or condone it. For Republicans, it will become a case of “when you’re explaining, you’re losing.”

McConnell understood all too clearly the danger facing the party’s candidates, and set out to inoculate them from it as effectively as possible. And that meant a clean and public break from Trump – no more bending the knee in the direction of Mar-A-Lago.

To be sure, the ex-president will retain a bloc of party loyalists and continue to issue verbal rockets from his Florida redoubt. He’s raised significant sums of money to spend on himself and favored candidates. He cannot be completely discounted.

At stake, though, is the soul of the Republican Party, one that still glimmers despite the assault on it. McConnell’s rejection of Trumpism is a major step toward that end.

Carl Golden is a senior contributing analyst with the William J. Hughes Center for Public Policy at Stockton University in New Jersey. You can reach him at cgolden1937@gmail.