| | |  | BY CHARLIE MAHTESIAN | Presented by LiveWire Electric Motorcycles | | 
Former President Donald Trump mingles with supporters during an election night event at Mar-a-Lago. | Joe Raedle/Getty Images | DEAD WEIGHT — Imagine you knew the results of the 2022 exit polls in advance of last week’s election. That the Republican Party would be trusted more to handle crime (52 percent to 43 percent), immigration (51-45) and foreign policy (51-45). That inflation would rate as the most important issue among voters, and that the GOP would be the party trusted more by voters to handle it — by a double-digit margin (54-42). Further, imagine those same exit polls revealed that voters said Republicans should control the House, by a 50-47 margin. That President Joe Biden’s job approval rating would be underwater (44-55) and his favorability rating would be even worse. Between those numbers and the historical precedent of the party out of power picking up seats in midterm elections, it would have seemed like the GOP was poised for a runaway victory. Instead, Democrats have held the Senate and control of the House remains up in the air , almost one week after Election Day. Abortion rights played an important role in altering the dynamics of the 2022 election. But the exit polls and the still-unfolding House and Senate map increasingly tell the story of an election where Donald Trump torpedoed his party — and, on the eve of his widely expected announcement of another presidential run , he might do the same again in 2024. The more races are called, the more obvious it becomes. There is Nevada, home to three of the nation’s tightest House races and one of its most competitive Senate contests. When the Senate race was finally called this weekend, all four remained in Democratic hands. Despite an October rally for the GOP ticket, Trump did these candidates few favors — 29 percent of Nevada voters said their vote was in opposition to the former president. Nevada Republicans did post one important victory, ousting Democratic Gov. Steve Sisolak. But even in that case, Trump was more hindrance than asset. According to a New York Times account , after Republican Joe Lombardo declined to call Trump a ‘great’ president and backed off Trump’s false claim of a stolen election, Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel had to convince the former president not to pull his endorsement of Lombardo. In Illinois, Michigan and Pennsylvania, it was a similar story. Between the three states, there were 11 House races rated as either Lean Democratic or Toss-Up by POLITICO . Every one of them ended up in Democratic hands as Trump-endorsed, hard-line candidates for governor helped drag their tickets to defeat. Trump’s invisible hand, in fact, left fingerprints all over the House map. Two GOP-held House seats flipped this year after Trump helped oust their previously ensconced incumbents as a payback for their impeachment vote. Maryland missed a rare chance to add a second Republican seat — Democratic Rep. David Trone narrowly defeated Republican Neil Parrott, a victim of the undertow of a governor’s race where Trump-endorsed Republican Dan Cox lost in a landslide. New England’s chance of reviving the GOP brand fell short after a handful of top GOP House contenders fell short. In New Hampshire, where two of them failed and Sen. Maggie Hassan won reelection, roughly one-third of voters (32 percent) said they voted to oppose Trump. In swing state after swing state, this was a midterm election that Trump changed from a referendum on an unpopular Biden into a choice between the two. It was most obvious in the razor-close races that determined control of the Senate, where Democratic incumbents were in serious danger of being dragged down by Biden’s weak approval ratings. In Pennsylvania, Democrats also flipped a GOP-held Senate seat, despite Biden’s approval rating being underwater there at 46-53. Trump, it turns out, was even more unpopular. The exit polls put Trump’s favorability rating at 40-58. Just over a quarter of the electorate (26 percent) said their vote was to oppose Trump — and 91 percent of them voted for Democratic Senate nominee John Fetterman over Republican Mehmet Oz. In Arizona, 38 percent said they voted to oppose Biden. But 35 percent voted to oppose Trump. In Wisconsin, it was dead even at 30 percent. Trump wasn’t electoral poison across the map. Most of the GOP incumbents he backed in the House and Senate won (many, of course, weren’t in competitive races). Two of his endorsees for open Senate seats — J. D. Vance in Ohio and Ted Budd in North Carolina — won. It’s a good time for the GOP to do something the party stopped doing while Trump was in the White House: a thorough autopsy of the election results and Trump’s role in influencing them. They’ll likely find that some of the party’s biggest winners last week — among them Govs. Mike DeWine, Brian Kemp and Ron DeSantis, as well as South Dakota Sen. John Thune — either are, or have been, at odds with Trump. And they’ll likely find that a Senate majority was well within their grasp. So was a bigger House majority. Welcome to POLITICO Nightly. Reach out with news, tips and ideas at nightly@politico.com . Or contact tonight’s author at cmahtesian@politico.com or on Twitter at @PoliticoCharlie .
| |
A message from LiveWire Electric Motorcycles: Support American Electric Motorcycles. Learn more. | | | | | — Supreme Court allows Jan. 6 committee to access Arizona GOP chair’s phone records: The Supreme Court has cleared the way for the House’s Jan. 6 select committee to obtain the phone records of Arizona GOP Chair Kelli Ward , a key ally during Trump’s effort to subvert the 2020 election. The justices, with noted opposition from Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, today denied Ward’s emergency motion to block the panel from enforcing a subpoena against T-Mobile to obtain Ward’s records. — University of California academic workers go on strike for higher wages in largest walkout in U.S. higher education: University of California academic workers walked off the job today across the 10-campus system , seeking higher wages and better benefits in what organizers are calling the largest strike in the history of U.S. higher education. Bargaining units for nearly 50,000 teaching assistants, researchers and other scholars failed to reach a contract that met union demands amid soaring housing costs and inflation for people who provide much of the instruction for undergraduates in the system. — Club for Growth steps on Trump relaunch with polls showing DeSantis beating him: The conservative Club for Growth is sending a warning shot at Trump on the eve of his expected 2024 campaign launch — and indicating it might back his chief potential rival, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. The anti-tax organization, which was once a staunch Trump ally but over the last year has broken with him, today provided POLITICO with a polling memo showing the former president trailing DeSantis by double digits in one-on-one matchups in Iowa and New Hampshire, the first two states on the GOP nominating calendar. The surveys also show DeSantis leading Trump by wide margins in Florida, their shared home state, and Georgia, which is holding a Dec. 6 runoff for one of its Senate seats. — Justice Department accuses Trump of ‘shell game’ with Mar-a-Lago documents: Trump mischaracterized White House documents he retained after leaving office as “personal,” the Justice Department argued in a newly unsealed court filing, accusing Trump of engaging in a “shell game” to shield documents from criminal investigators. In the filing, unsealed today by U.S. District Court Judge Aileen Cannon, prosecutors contended Trump has sought to restrict investigators’ access to materials — seized by the FBI in August from his Mar-a-Lago estate — by inappropriately claiming they’re his personal property. Federal law permits presidents to declare some records as “personal” so long as they have no decision-making value to future administrations.
| |
| | GO INSIDE THE MILKEN INSTITUTE FUTURE OF HEALTH SUMMIT: POLITICO is featuring a special edition of our “Future Pulse” newsletter at the 2022 Milken Institute Future of Health Summit from Dec. 6 to 8. The newsletter takes readers inside one of the most influential gatherings of health industry leaders and innovators solving the biggest global health issues to ensure a healthier, more resilient future for all. SUBSCRIBE TODAY TO RECEIVE EXCLUSIVE COVERAGE . | | | | | | | | 
Chief of Staff of Ethiopian Armed Forces Field Marshall Birhanu Jula, left, and Head of the Tigray Forces Lieutenant General Tadesse Werede, right, exchange signed copies of an agreement, at Ethiopian peace talks in Nairobi, Kenya. | AP Photo/Brian Inganga | PEACE PACT — After two years, the war in Ethiopia’s Tigray region is coming to an end following peace talks in Nairobi, Kenya, and a truce struck earlier this month. On Saturday, military leaders from both sides agreed to a peace roadmap that includes “unhindered humanitarian access to the region” and a joint disarmament committee, the Associated Press reports: “Both parties have agreed to protect civilians and facilitate the delivery of humanitarian aid to the region of more than 5 million people, according to a copy of the agreement seen by The Associated Press. “The agreement states that disarmament will be ‘done concurrently with the withdrawal of foreign and non-(Ethiopian military) forces’ from Tigray. “The lead negotiator for Ethiopia, Redwan Hussein, told the AP that Saturday’s signing event created a conducive environment for ongoing peace efforts, noting that the next meeting of military leaders will ‘most likely’ be held in Tigray in mid-December before a final meeting in Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital, in January. “The Tigray conflict began in November 2020, less than a year after Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for making peace with Eritrea, which borders the Tigray region and whose fighters have been fighting alongside Ethiopian federal troops in Tigray. “The war in Africa’s second-most populous country, which marked two years on Nov. 4, has seen abuses documented on both sides, with millions of people displaced and many near famine.” ADULTS IN THE ROOM — Giorgia Meloni’s new Italian government has only been in power a few weeks, and already the grown-ups have had to step in, writes Hannah Roberts . As a dispute between Italy and France over taking in migrants escalated , President Sergio Mattarella, Italy’s head of state, personally intervened, holding a phone call with President Emmanuel Macron this morning. The Italian and French presidents’ offices said in a joint statement that the two leaders agreed on the “great importance” of relations between the two countries and on the need for full cooperation, both in the bilateral sphere and within the European Union. Italy’s president has a largely ceremonial role, with constitutional powers to step in when a government collapses. However, Mattarella, who has a good relationship with Macron and helped deliver a treaty of cooperation between Italy and France last year, took the unusual step of publicly stepping in to smooth over the row between Meloni, the prime minister, and Macron’s government. Europe has not resolved the migration issue and both sides are under pressure on that front domestically — Macron from the far right and Meloni from her coalition partner Matteo Salvini, leader of the League.
| |
| | A message from LiveWire Electric Motorcycles: 
| | | | | | |
20 The number of House seats that remain uncalled . Republicans would have to win six of those seats for a House majority, while Democrats would need 15 — a prospect that looks increasingly unlikely. “I think it’s going to be very close, but I don’t think we’re going to make it,” Biden told reporters at the G-20 summit in Indonesia today. |
| | | CELEBRITY SKIN IN THE GAME — After Beto O’Rourke lost statewide in Texas again, it’s become abundantly clear that Democrats have a thin bench in the state. One possible solution? Look to the celebrities . Some seem more viable (Eva Longoria, Matthew McConnaughey), while others could be absurd (Megan Thee Stallion), but no idea should be too crazy for Democrats in Texas, according to Dan Solomon in Texas Monthly.
| |
| | POLITICO APP USERS: UPGRADE YOUR APP BY DECEMBER 19! We recently upgraded the POLITICO app with a fresh look and improved features for easier access to POLITICO's scoops and groundbreaking reporting. Starting December 19, users will no longer have access to the previous version of the app. Update your app today to stay on top of essential political news, insights, and analysis from the best journalists in the business. UPDATE iOS APP – UPDATE ANDROID APP . | | | | | | | | 
Illustration by Alex Fine for POLITICO; Headshots: AP, Getty | THE ART OF (INTRAPARTY) WAR — Democrats defied history and escaped a midterm beating. Yet as 2024 looms, many Democrats are still feeling anxious about their standing as they pore over the exit poll data, writes Bill Scher . Fifty-one percent of respondents said the Democratic Party is “too extreme” (1 point less than the GOP). Majorities prefer Republicans to deal with inflation, crime and immigration. And not only was Biden’s job approval number a limp 44 percent, a whopping 67 percent of respondents don’t want him to run again. That includes nearly half of the Democrats polled. A chipper Biden said after the midterms that he intends to stand for reelection. Yet many Democratic lawmakers also appear to side with the skittish wing of the party’s rank-and-file, according to POLITICO’s Jonathan Martin, who reported that their “dread about 2024 extends from the specter of nominating an octogenarian with dismal approval ratings to the equally delicate dilemma of whether to nominate his more unpopular vice president or pass over the first Black woman in the job.” Amid growing Democratic nervousness about 2024 — particularly as Trump appears to prepare for another White House bid — ambitious, impatient Democrats may see an opportunity to challenge a vulnerable president from their own party. But if they want to throw Biden from the train, and not just see Vice President Kamala Harris take over as conductor, they can’t copy a prior template of success. They will have to find a way to do what hasn’t been done in the modern era of presidential primaries. Only Ronald Reagan in 1976 and Ted Kennedy in 1980 won any primary contests against an incumbent president, before ultimately falling short. Read Scher’s lessons from the past for shaping a plausible insurgent strategy , as well as some Democrats who he thinks might have the juice to pull it off. Did someone forward this email to you? Sign up here .
| |
A message from LiveWire Electric Motorcycles: As the first all-electric motorcycle company listed on the NYSE, we believe American EV motorcycle buyers deserve a tax credit, just like EV car buyers. Reinstate the federal tax credits for American electric motorcycles. | | | | |
|
| | Follow us on Twitter | | | FOLLOW US | | |
| |
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.