Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on Tuesday directly put the blame for the low “candidate quality” for the 2022 midterm elections on former President Trump. This is after the GOP failed to secure victories in many key races.
While speaking to reporters only a week after the Republicans lost the final Senate race in Georgia, McConnell said that the weak candidates were predominantly at fault for the losses in many battleground states.
McConnell also told reporters that he had never claimed there would be a “red wave” but rather that they would have a number of close races. In this McConnell also echoes the caution he had expressed in August when many other Republicans were predicting that there would be many seats flipped in the midterm elections.
He also added that in the end, they had some clear “candidate quality” issues which were evident in the races in Arizona, New Hampshire and even Georgia.
McConnell added that his affiliated super PAC, the Senate Leadership Fund, did attempt to interview in the Alabama and Missouri primaries, but there are not many GOP leaders who could do that when there are Trump endorsed MAGA style candidates who are happy to claim that the 2020 election had been stolen. He added that while the support of the former President is decisive in the primaries, that does not necessarily mean that those same candidates would win the midterms, as was exhibited.
