Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer accused the chamber’s top Republican of either intentionally wanting Russia to interfere with U.S. elections or being scared of President Trump’s temper tantrums.

The New York Democrat told Sirius XM’s Joe Madison there was “no good explanation” for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to be blocking election security bills, saying they should be among the “non-partisan issues.”

“This is what Americans have died for through all our wars to protect the right to vote,” Mr. Schumer said. “So now you’re going to let the Russians bollocks it up and interfere with it?”

When Mr. Madison asked why Mr. Schumer why Mr. McConnell is acting as he is, the New York said he could imagine “only two reasons.”

“One, they want the Russians to interfere because they think it’ll help them. It’s clear. Mueller made this clear that the Russians wanted Trump to win,” he said. “The second is another reason not so good. Donald Trump in his puerile babyishness, if that’s even a word, is so upset at the fact that the Russians might have interfered, that it delegitimizes his election, and McConnell is so scared of Trump that he goes along.”

Mr. Schumer predicted that Mr. McConnell’s stonewalling won’t last forever, vowing that controversy will come “down like a hammer on him” after August recess.

“Prediction. When we come back in September from our state work people, he’s going to be forced to put some good protections on the floor,” he said, saying there would be pressure from others Republican party.

Mr. McConnell blocked a House bill that would have allocated $775 million to prevent Russian hacking on state election systems this week,

In response, liberal critics began calling him “Moscow Mitch” and multiple versions of #MoscowMitch began trending on Twitter afterward. Mr. McConnellresponded by calling himself a victim of “modern-day McCarthyism.”

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