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Molly Jong-Fast: Donald Trump's Candidates Keep Delivering...for Democrats
Molly Jong-Fast
I wrote about trump’s MAGA candidates in Vanity Fair.
https://vanityfair.com/news/story/donald-trump-maga-candidates-2024 (archived: https://archive.ph/YWMpo )
3:35 PM · Sep 30, 2024
I wrote about trump’s MAGA candidates in Vanity Fair.
https://vanityfair.com/news/story/donald-trump-maga-candidates-2024 (archived: https://archive.ph/YWMpo )
3:35 PM · Sep 30, 2024
Vanity Fair (archived) - Donald Trump’s Candidates Keep Delivering…for Democrats
Republicans didn’t learn their lesson in 2022, as MAGA mini-mes could once again cost the party winnable races.
By Molly Jong-Fast
September 30, 2024
In 2022, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell mused about “candidate quality” when talking about why Republicans might not win the upper chamber. Those two words broadly summed up the problem that’s often plagued MAGA candidates, who can appear unvetted, unhinged, and simply disconnected from the political reality of the election cycle. Back then, you had Donald Trump–endorsed candidates like Herschel Walker, Mehmet Oz, and Blake Masters losing key Senate races in battleground states of Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Arizona. Meanwhile, in the latter two states, Trump picks like Doug Mastriano and Kari Lake failed to win gubernatorial races.
But one quality that MAGA candidates tend to have is fealty to Trump. And once you’ve sworn fealty to Trump, it’s very hard to lose his endorsement. Just look at North Carolina, where self-proclaimed “Black Nazi” and Nude Africa user Mark Robinson still hasn’t lost Trump’s support, despite being abandoned by much of his campaign staff. (Robinson has denied writing comments on Nude Africa calling himself a Black Nazi.) Sure, Trump may not hit the trail alongside Robinson—except by way of a cardboard cutout—but he reportedly couldn’t be persuaded by Republican calls to try and push him out.
The 2024 Senate map has always looked rough for Democrats, who have to defend seats in ruby red states like Ohio (Sherrod Brown) and Montana (Jon Tester), as well as West Virginia, which won’t have Joe Manchin on the ballot and is sure to fall into Republican hands. They also have tough contests in swing states like Arizona (Ruben Gallego), Michigan (Elissa Slotkin), Nevada (Jacky Rosen), Wisconsin (Tammy Baldwin), and Pennsylvania (Bob Casey). And then there were all those governorships, like in North Carolina, which hasn’t gone Democratic in the presidential since 2008, and swingy New Hampshire. But luckily for Democrats Trumpism is still the driving force of this Republican Party.
One of the many truisms of MAGA is that it doesn’t scale; only Trump can do it. When other candidates do MAGA they tend to be wildly unpopular; mini Trump JD Vance has a favorability rating that’s underwater by 11 points, according to 538. The Ohio senator, just like Ron DeSantis before him, shows that only Trump can do Trump. Speaking of Ohio, Trump is leading Kamala Harris 50% to 44%, according to a recent New York Times/Siena College poll, while the Senate candidate he endorsed, Bernie Moreno, trails by four points.
/snip
Republicans didn’t learn their lesson in 2022, as MAGA mini-mes could once again cost the party winnable races.
By Molly Jong-Fast
September 30, 2024
In 2022, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell mused about “candidate quality” when talking about why Republicans might not win the upper chamber. Those two words broadly summed up the problem that’s often plagued MAGA candidates, who can appear unvetted, unhinged, and simply disconnected from the political reality of the election cycle. Back then, you had Donald Trump–endorsed candidates like Herschel Walker, Mehmet Oz, and Blake Masters losing key Senate races in battleground states of Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Arizona. Meanwhile, in the latter two states, Trump picks like Doug Mastriano and Kari Lake failed to win gubernatorial races.
But one quality that MAGA candidates tend to have is fealty to Trump. And once you’ve sworn fealty to Trump, it’s very hard to lose his endorsement. Just look at North Carolina, where self-proclaimed “Black Nazi” and Nude Africa user Mark Robinson still hasn’t lost Trump’s support, despite being abandoned by much of his campaign staff. (Robinson has denied writing comments on Nude Africa calling himself a Black Nazi.) Sure, Trump may not hit the trail alongside Robinson—except by way of a cardboard cutout—but he reportedly couldn’t be persuaded by Republican calls to try and push him out.
The 2024 Senate map has always looked rough for Democrats, who have to defend seats in ruby red states like Ohio (Sherrod Brown) and Montana (Jon Tester), as well as West Virginia, which won’t have Joe Manchin on the ballot and is sure to fall into Republican hands. They also have tough contests in swing states like Arizona (Ruben Gallego), Michigan (Elissa Slotkin), Nevada (Jacky Rosen), Wisconsin (Tammy Baldwin), and Pennsylvania (Bob Casey). And then there were all those governorships, like in North Carolina, which hasn’t gone Democratic in the presidential since 2008, and swingy New Hampshire. But luckily for Democrats Trumpism is still the driving force of this Republican Party.
One of the many truisms of MAGA is that it doesn’t scale; only Trump can do it. When other candidates do MAGA they tend to be wildly unpopular; mini Trump JD Vance has a favorability rating that’s underwater by 11 points, according to 538. The Ohio senator, just like Ron DeSantis before him, shows that only Trump can do Trump. Speaking of Ohio, Trump is leading Kamala Harris 50% to 44%, according to a recent New York Times/Siena College poll, while the Senate candidate he endorsed, Bernie Moreno, trails by four points.
/snip
Link to tweet