Republican pundits have been conducting autopsies on the party’s failure to produce a red wave in the 2022 Midterm elections.
Fingers of blame are being pointed in several directions.
But some candidates are pointing theirs directly at Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY).
Republicans had high expectations heading into the 2020 Midterms.
However, as the dust settled and the smoke cleared, a red wave didn’t materialize.
There were some high points for the GOP on election night, like taking back the majority in the U.S. House of Representatives.
However, they did so only by the skin of their teeth.
Republicans lost gubernatorial seats.
And they failed to take back the U.S. Senate.
In fact, the GOP could even lose a seat in the Upper Chamber if Herschel Walker isn’t able to win the December 6 runoff in Georgia against incumbent Democrat Sen. Raphael Warnock.
Regardless of the outcome in Georgia, many say the rout of GOP candidates in the 2022 Midterms falls at McConnell’s feet.
However, the Georgia runoff would have control of the Senate on the line had Republicans been able to flip the Arizona seat.
Republican Blake Master was challenging incumbent Democrat Sen. Mark Kelly in one of the most competitive races in the country.
Back in August, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s Super PAC pulled a planned $8-Million ad buy in the Grand Canyon State against Kelly.
Not only did the GOP Senate leader do an about-face and pull the funds originally earmarked for the ultra-competitive Arizona, he also did the same in the New Hampshire Senate contest.
Instead, McConnell decided the best use of Party donors’ hard-earned contributions was up north in Alaska – a state where it was widely agreed a Republican was guaranteed to win regardless.
There was a competitive race in The Last Frontier – however, it wasn’t between a Republican and a Democrat.
No, in Alaska, the race was between long-time RINO Lisa Murkowski and Trump-endorsed Kelly Tshibaka, also a Republican.
No Democrat had a prayer of winning the Alaska Senate seat, but McConnell wanted to spend Republican donor money there anyway.
Murkowski is notorious for being perhaps the most Left-leaning Republican in the Upper Chamber.
She also endorsed Sarah Palin’s Congressional opponent – incumbent Democrat Rep. Mary Pelota.
Tshibaka, on the other hand, was not only backed by Trump, but also went on record saying she would not support McConnell for Majority Leader.
McConnell’s PAC money did the trick for Murkowski, thanks to Alaska’s controversial, convoluted and confusing Ranked Choice Voting elections experiment, the incumbent narrowly retained her seat with second place votes in the second round of ballot counting.
Meanwhile, clouded in controversy, Kelly was able to win re-election with just 51.4% of the vote.
Tshibaka believes McConnell’s vindictive allocation of PAC funding may have cost the GOP a chance at the majority in the Upper Chamber.
“It is regrettable that Sen. Mitch McConnell spent millions of dollars in this race on deceptive ads to secure what he wanted – a Senate minority that he can control, as opposed to a majority that he could not,” she said. “Donors’ money would have been better spent in other states to elect more Republicans that would have secured a majority in the Senate.”
Tshibaka added that her loss to Murkowski was just “another victory for the Washington, D.C., insiders who rarely have our best interests at heart.”
Political Animal News will keep you up-to-date on any new developments in this ongoing story.
