Republicans Forced to Reckon With How They Destroyed Their Own Party

Republican lawmakers are being forced to own up to just how badly the midterm elections went for their parties—and it’s delicious.

Speaking at a press conference Wednesday, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis blamed Republican lawmakers for making bad votes, like opposing legislation that would ban stock trading, and for the botched release of the government’s files on disgraced sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

Florida saw Republicans narrowly keep control of the government, but in Texas, DeSantis said, “not only did they lose a very highly publicized U.S. Senate race, they lost everything.”

“Let’s just be clear, that is going to hurt, not just for the next two years. That’s something that can reverberate for the next decade or more,” DeSantis said. “And if the Republican Party doesn’t have Texas as an anchor then we are not going to be viable nationally.”

Republicans may not be able to retake the Senate in 2028, DeSantis warned, and it was “probably not viable” to retake the House. This was the “worst-case scenario,” he added.

Texas Senator John Cornyn, who will be succeeded by Democrat James Talarico, declared that his party had forgotten what really mattered.

“Last night, Republicans lost the U.S. House, the U.S. Senate, and my home state of Texas, a conservative cornerstone for more than three decades, because our party forgot the basic rules of coalition politics: 1. Add, don’t subtract 2. Be likeable 3. Do what you promised 4. Character & integrity still matter,” he wrote on X.

Former Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney also weighed in on his party’s clear miscalculation.

“Bad policy, bad character make bad politics: erratic tariffs, impulsive Iran war, blanket pardons, apparent corruption, weaponized justice, ICE brutality, mountainous deficits, hiding Epstein, abandoning allies and coddling enemies. Hoping for a course correction, for the country and for my party,” Romney wrote on X Wednesday.

Earlier Wednesday, Vice President JD Vance opted out of a mea culpa, instead blaming Republican losses on President Donald Trump’s unpopular war against Iran. Strangely, even Donald Trump Jr. agreed.

With Democratic victories in state legislatures and governorships across the country Tuesday, the Electoral College could now be in jeopardy—even without a near-impossible constitutional amendment.

If passed by enough states, the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact would effectively nullify the Electoral College and, with it, the possibility of a candidate being elected president without winning the popular vote. Since the compact was introduced in 2006, 19 states have passed it, agreeing to assign their electoral votes to whichever candidate wins the national popular vote. That amounts to 222 of the 270 electoral votes that a candidate needs to win the presidential election.

On Tuesday, Democrats took control of state legislatures and governorships in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Arizona, Wisconsin, and Nevada, all states that haven’t agreed to the compact. If all five vote to join, then the total number of electoral votes apportioned based on the national popular vote jumps to 283.

That all depends on whether Democrats in these states think that the compact is a priority. Democrats in Michigan failed to pass the compact when they held a trifecta from 2023 to 2024, and Nevada’s Democratic governor vetoed the compact in 2019, saying that it would hurt the state’s role in presidential elections.

There are also potential constitutional issues. In Article 2, Section 1, Clauses 2 and 3, the Constitution says that states can appoint electors “in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct.” But in Article 1, Section 10, Clause 3, it also prohibits interstate compacts without the consent of Congress.

The Democratic takeover of Congress would seemingly make this moot, and in theory, if the compact comes to a vote in the House and Senate, it wouldn’t even need the president’s signature. But Democrats still don’t have a filibuster-proof majority of 60 votes in the Senate, and with their dwindling national popularity, Republicans would undoubtedly try to block nullifying the Electoral College. After all, four of the five presidents who have won the presidency while losing the popular vote were Republicans, including President Donald Trump in 2016.

President Trump couldn’t seem to care less about Republicans losing control of the House and Senate to Democrats on Tuesday night.

The president offered brief remarks on the GOP carnage following a baffling ceremony at the construction site of his controversial White House ballroom.

“Sir, you held 30 rallies across the country, gave your final speech in front of the Reflecting Pool,” a reporter asked, referencing the way Trump centered himself in so many of the failed House and Senate campaigns. “Do you have any regrets about the way you closed out the campaign?”

“No, look if I were on the ballot we would’ve won. You saw the people, they were packed. Thousands and thousands of people at every rally. And if I was on the ballot we would’ve won.… There was such love at those rallies, it was incredible. We weren’t able to transfer the love to candidates.”

When asked if he was concerned about the prospect of impeachment from a Democratic-controlled Congress, the president replied, “Not even a little bit.”

“I think it would destroy the Democrat Party if they did that. It’s impeachment for no reason. What, for having a successful country? Our country is more successful now than at any time in its history.”

“Watch the beam go up,” he suddenly declared, before pointing to a large piece of metal being hoisted into the air over the construction site.

The president also said he would’ve “done nothing different” regarding the Iran war—despite acknowledging it lost Republicans the election, as Vice President JD Vance noted. He also said that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s job was safe for the moment, even as other reports reveal Trump has been considering firing him and blaming him for the Iran war.

President Donald Trump may soon give Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth the axe after Republicans lost massively in Tuesday’s midterm elections.

CBS News reports that the president has been asking advisers if Hegseth should keep his job due to the Iran war going so poorly, a fact that swayed many voters. NBC’s exit polls showed that 74 percent of voters saw the Iran war as a crucial or major factor in how they voted. Hegseth was already in the hot seat before the midterms, with many in Congress calling for his impeachment, including outgoing Republican Representative Thomas Massie.

Hegseth was reportedly hoping Tennessee Senator Marsha Blackburn would be elected the state’s governor so that she could appoint him to fill the seat. That way, he could have a graceful exit and avoid the mess of being impeached or fired. Blackburn did win her race, but Hegseth would still face competition from other hopefuls such as Republican Representative Tim Burchett, who campaigned for Blackburn.

If Hegseth goes, one of CBS’s sources said that Florida Governor Ron DeSantis could be a possible replacement, and could get a speedy confirmation by the lame-duck Republican Senate before the end of the year.

Trump hasn’t made his decision yet, however, and some of CBS’s sources in the White House think that he might direct blame at other military leaders, such as Admiral Brad Cooper, head of U.S. Central Command, or Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Dan Caine. White House spokesperson Anna Kelly said in a statement that Hegseth had Trump’s full confidence, praising military efforts in Venezuela and the Iran war while also touting Hegseth’s attacks on “DEI and woke ideology.”

Speaking to reporters Wednesday, Trump gave Hegseth a vote of confidence, saying outside of the White House, “I think he’s doing a very good job.”

When asked if he wanted Hegseth to fill Blackburn’s Senate seat, Trump said, “I actually think he’d be very popular if he did that, but I haven’t heard that at all.”

Republicans tried to upend Democratic election odds by redrawing congressional districts across the country, but even that wasn’t enough to dam the blue wave.

Despite making new maps to boost Republican candidates in Florida, North Carolina, Ohio, Texas, Alabama, and Utah, voters in those states by and large still chose Democrats to represent them.

For more than a year, local legislators in the Lone Star State were explicitly pushed by Donald Trump and his allies to forgo tradition and create a new congressional map for the 2026 election. State Republicans complied, carving up five historically Democratic districts into supposedly MAGA-friendly inventions.

But the plan backfired spectacularly. Republicans lost four of the five supposedly GOP-friendly seats they had created, as well as another two of their own.

Alabama voters also rejected the state GOP’s gerrymandering efforts, opting to send Democratic Representative Shomari Figures back to Congress.

Earlier this year, Governor Ron DeSantis redrew 20 of Florida’s 28 U.S. House districts. At the time, four newly created districts were expected to turn red. But they didn’t, and Florida Democrats remain poised to retain their targeted seats. Representatives Jared Moskowitz, Kathy Castor, and Debbie Wasserman Schultz were able to fend off Republican challengers, while first-time candidate Pia Dandiya outcompeted Republican nominee Casey Askar. The results for Florida’s 9th congressional district have not yet been called, though Democratic Representative Darren Soto has a slight lead.

Democrat Ben McAdams turned the tide in Utah’s redrawn first congressional district, besting Republican nominee Riley Owen by a margin of 47 points.

Ohio voters not only stuck to their Democratic incumbents despite similar redistricting efforts, but the liberal party also gained two more House seats (with potentially a third on the way, according to the Ohio Capital Journal). Democrats won big in Ohio’s gubernatorial and Senate races too, electing Dr. Amy Acton and Sherrod Brown, respectively.

Democrats enjoyed a landslide victory in North Carolina, despite voting under a new map that should have easily handed an additional House seat to Republicans by massively reconfiguring congressional districts 1 and 3. At the time of publication, just four out of 14 races have been called by the Associated Press, though Democratic Representative Don Davis was leading by more than 4 percent with 99 percent of the district votes counted.

Voters outright rejected a new congressional map in Missouri, where Republican leadership had prematurely decided to rely on a redistricted map during its primary election in August, effectively stripping many Missourans of the opportunity to elect their congressional nominees. The courts ultimately ordered Missouri to use the state’s original 2020 congressional map for Tuesday’s election. After the votes were tabulated, Democrats had gained an additional House seat.

Meanwhile, in Louisiana, the top two performers in the state’s 6th House district are headed to a December runoff race. They include Democrat Chauna Banks and Republican Blake Miguez.

But it wasn’t a unanimous Democratic victory. Tennessee’s decision to carve up Memphis into three separate congressional districts effectively thwarted the city’s historically Democratic vote. At the time of publication, Republicans were projected to win in three of four House races in Tennessee, while Democratic nominee Victoria Broderick peeled ahead by just fractions of a percentage point in Tennessee’s 4th congressional district.