Republicans want to lose a fourth consecutive election with Trump heading their party
Zachary Faria
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Republicans choked away an opportunity to regain the Senate in the 2022 midterm elections, and they are apparently willing to take the same risk again in 2024 out of an undying, and unreturned, loyalty to former President Donald Trump.
Sen. Steve Daines (R-MT) endorsed Trump for the 2024 GOP nomination, even though it is only April 2023. Most of the endorsement news this far out is fairly meaningless — no one is being persuaded between voting for Trump, Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL), or another candidate based on whom random House members endorse — but this is different. Daines is the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee.
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The NRSC under its previous chairman, Sen. Rick Scott (FL), allowed Trump’s favorite candidates to become nominees in several states in 2022, and the result was a predictable disaster. Republicans blew winnable races in Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Arizona and allowed Democrats to retain control of the chamber for two more years.
Upon taking over the NRSC, Daines decided that the NRSC would get more involved in primary races to prevent the same thing from happening. He has even reportedly been in contact with Trump throughout the year to “keep Trump aligned with Republican leadership” in Senate primaries.
Meanwhile, the NRSC is still trying to clean up Trump’s mess from 2022, looking to back Republican David McCormick for the nomination in Pennsylvania over gubernatorial race loser, and Trump disciple, Doug Mastriano. McCormick should have been the Senate nominee in 2022, but he was beaten in the primary by Trump-endorsed celebrity Dr. Mehmet Oz.
So, Daines is backing Trump to run against someone he already lost to while the NRSC is doing what it can to prevent Trump from selecting more terrible Senate candidates. Trump is supposedly the best candidate to run for president, but his decision-making will sink the GOP’s chances of retaking the Senate.
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Put aside Trump’s history of sinking the party, both by actively sabotaging Senate races and by just generally being toxic to independent voters. What exactly is the logic in making him the face of the party but keeping him away from the Senate primaries?
We know the Republican Party under Trump loves losing, which is why he is somehow still a force in the party despite his 2020 loss to an elderly candidate in hiding. Daines’s decision, while the NRSC is actively trying to keep Trump at arm’s length, reinforces this. Republicans lost under Trump in 2018, 2020, and 2022, and Republican politicians are now all lining up behind the same loser again.