Donald Trump's Favorite Candidates in the 2022 Midterms Had a Pretty Bad Election Night
For Donald Trump, Tuesday night was not only meant to be a celebration of Republican strength, but also a launch party. Banking on the prospect of a red wave, the former president teased riding the midterm momentum into an early presidential-campaign announcement. In this scenario, Trump, hailed a kingmaker, having spent the past year and a half endorsing more than 300 candidates, would announce his 2024 presidential run with a decisive mandate from the country. Instead, many of his anointed candidates lost Tuesday night. Trump was reportedly left “livid,” blaming the losses on allies and advisers, including his wife, Melania. Pundits—including some Republicans—have already chalked up the midterms as another repudiation of Trump. “How could you look at these results tonight and conclude Trump has any chance of winning a national election in 2024?” Scott Jennings, a former George W. Bush adviser, wrote.
Tuesday night made clear that the Trump-obsessed Republican Party wouldn’t be bringing on a Democratic bloodbath. In the vital Pennsylvania Senate race, Mehmet Oz, the daytime-talk-show host turned aspiring politician, lost to Democratic lieutenant governor John Fetterman, who scored 57% of the independent vote on his way to fill retiring Republican senator Pat Toomey’s seat. Oz, who has no political experience, managed to win the GOP nomination over an establishment Republican due in large part to Trump’s endorsement. In the last few weeks, Oz looked like he had the chance to win outright. But roughly five hours after Pennsylvania’s polls closed, Fetterman had already given his victory speech. The news of Oz’s defeat came after another one of Trump’s picks crashed in the state: Republican gubernatorial candidate Doug Mastriano was crushed by Democrat Josh Shapiro. Mastriano, who was at the Capitol on January 6, campaigned for a strict abortion ban, flirted with the QAnon movement, and questioned the separation between church and state.
Don Bolduc, another Trump endorsee, lost his Senate bid against incumbent Democrat Maggie Hassan in New Hampshire—an outcome that Trump blamed on Bolduc for recently recognizing the 2020 election as legitimate. Gretchen Whitmer handily defeated Trump-pick Tudor Dixon in Michigan’s governor’s race as did Democrat Tony Evers in Wisconsin, against Trump-endorsed Tim Michels. In fact, as HuffPost reported, all six 2020 election-denying, Trump-loving candidates that Democrats, albeit riskily, boosted in the primary process, lost in the general election.
There’s still a lot that remains undecided. The Arizona Senate race between Democratic incumbent senator Mark Kelly and Republican Blake Masters, a Peter Thiel–backed venture capitalist who has never served in elected office, was still too close as of Wednesday afternoon. As was Kari Lake’s Arizona governor’s race against Katie Hobbs (Lake has already questioned the election process, in Trumpian fashion). Trump endorsed Masters in the primary after the candidate proved his loyalty by airing an ad claiming that Trump “would still be president” if the 2020 election had not been rigged. And Trump seemingly sees Lake as one of his shining stars, apparently for her baseless insistence on voter fraud.
https://www.teenvogue.com/story/donald-trump-favorite-candidates-midterms-lost
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