One result from Tuesday’s midterm elections is already clear: Donald Trump’s political touch is anything but golden. The former president’s favored candidates largely tumbled as voters recoiled from their extremism.
Trump’s Svengali-like hold over the GOP is based mostly in fear that he’ll whip his followers into a frenzy against any Republican who crosses him. (Just ask Mike Pence.) But what happened Tuesday should convince Republicans that the threat of bucking Trump isn’t as politically dangerous to their party as embracing him.
As the vote-counting continues, Republicans might still retake the House, as has been long expected, with the Senate remaining a tossup. But make no mistake: The GOP’s undeniable failure to meet expectations in this election was in large part directly attributable to Trump’s disastrous role as self-appointed kingmaker. In congressional and state-level primaries around the country earlier this year, he bigfooted again and again to back the Republican candidates most solicitous to him and his election fraud lies, rather than those with the best chances to win.
