Almost all midterm election results are in. I think by now everybody knows that the Democrats are retaining the Senate while the Republicans are likely to win the House with a slim majority. The results are much better than the Democrats expected. So here are some winners and losers from Tuesday.
The biggest loser is Trump. His endorsed candidates, most of them deniers of the 2020 election results, lost in most cases in competitive states. These candidates, most of them incompetent, may have been the reason that the GOP lost the Senate again and did much worse than expected in the House. This shows again the Trump is bad for the Republicans. But that was obvious even in 2020 and many still followed him. Will this finally convince the GOP to get rid of Trump?
The big winner was Ron DeSantis who is also one of the reason that Trump is a big loser. DeSantis did not pledge allegiance to Trump and won big. His victory margin was impressive and may make him the front runner for the GOP in 2024.
Mitch McConnell is a loser. Even though not his fault, by not winning the Senate, many in the Republican party want to oust him as minority leader. I don't like McConnell but he has done a great job serving GOP interests in the Senate and it would be a mistake for them to oust him.
Kevin McCarthy was a winner and a loser. He most likely will become Speaker. But he will not have the majority he needs to push his agenda through without the Tea party extremists. So his hands are tied and he may have to seek compromise with the Democrats to pass relatively moderate agenda. But if he compromises with the Democrats, he will likely to have his leadership position challenged by the extremists in his party. He may even lose his leadership position. But given McConnell and McCarthy are both spineless, I don't feel sorry for either one.
One who did not lose but may lose influence is Joe Manchin. If Warnock beats Walker in the runoff, the Democrats will have an extra vote in the Senate and may not need to kowtow to Manchin in many issues. He may lose his position as the most powerful man in the Senate.
A possible winner is our democracy. By defeating most election result deniers and not having much controversies in this election, hopefully our democracy is more stable than any time since Trump was elected in 2016.
I am still baffled on how the NYC Democrats lost. Was it that they were too confident or did gerrymandering become involved?
ReplyDeleteI read that the GOP will try to push a bunch of stuff through but won't get much of their extreme agenda passed because it'll just be veto'd or won't pass in the senate anyways. I am interested to see what happens with Hunter Biden. But can't see Joe getting impeached. Though maybe this will help Joe decide whether to run again. I am not sure who would run on the Dem side and would beat Trump/DeSantis. Might be Bernie. I'd love to see Mayor Pete but don't know if the country is ready for a gay president. I don't think Harris would do well.
-LBOAYM
It depends on the economy. If it is bad, the Democrats will lose both houses and can only retain the presidency if Trump is the GOP nominee. DeSantis will win if the economy is bad in 2024.
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