RNC probes whether Trump is to blame for midterm losses – Rolling Stone

[ad_1]

The Republican National Committee is examining whether to blame Donald Trump for the party’s midterm losses as it creates a report examining why the predicted ‘red wave’ never materialized.

“Looking at President Trump, what did he get right? And what was wrong? And how do we learn from this to win elections in the future? Henry Barbour, an RNC committee member from Mississippi, told NBC News in an interview. RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel assigned Barbour, along with Harmeet Dhillon, a Trump attorney and RNC committee member from California, to co-author the RNC’s post-election review. Three dozen additional RNC members will also contribute to the report.

The Republican Party showed a lackluster performance last November against expectations that the GOP would take control of both houses of Congress. But even with President Biden’s low popularity and high inflation, the party only managed to take control of the House by a narrow margin (leading to its current problems electing a president), while the The Senate remained under Democratic control, thanks in part to Trump-endorsed candidates losing key races in Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, New Hampshire and Pennsylvania.

“What we intend to do is get into the weeds, to have data to confirm or certainly to give weight to the assessments that we make,” Barbour said. “It has to be a straightforward effort. We cannot ignore things. Or it’s just not worth doing.

Meanwhile, unhappy with some Republicans seeking to put the GOP’s losses at his feet, Trump tried to evade blame. “It wasn’t my fault that Republicans failed to live up to expectations mid-term,” Trump wrote on Truth Social last weekend. “I was 233-20! This is the ‘abortion issue’, mishandled by many Republicans, especially those who have strongly insisted on no exceptions, even in the case of rape, incest or of the life of the mother, who lost a large number of voters.

The former president went on to slam anti-abortion leaders, as well as Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. “Furthermore, the people who pushed so hard, for decades, against abortion, got their wish from the United States Supreme Court, and just disappeared, never to be seen again. Also, Mitch has stupid dollars!” he added, apparently implying that McConnell misspent the campaign funds.

McConnell, however, blamed “candidate quality” as the reason for the losses, naming three states – Arizona, New Hampshire and Georgia – where Trump endorsed unsuccessful Senate nominees. “Our ability to control the results of the primaries was quite limited in 22 because the former president’s support was very decisive in those primaries,” McConnell said.

[ad_2]