Last week, in a television studio in Atlanta, two men stood at their podiums under the bright lights of Georgia Public Broadcasting. It was the final debate in one of the most closely watched Senate races in the country. Early voting in Georgia was just getting underway.
Senator Jon Ossoff, his face grave with the weight of the moment, turned toward his Republican challenger, Congressman Mike Collins, and asked him a question no candidate for the United States Senate should ever have to be asked.
"Will you commit tonight that for the remainder of this campaign — it's just three weeks, Mike — you won't allow any more neo-Nazi propaganda to be produced from your house?"
Collins’s son-in-law, who lives in Collins’s home, had been accused of producing neo-Nazi propaganda from that house. Ossoff asked Collins to commit, right there, to putting a stop to it. Collins refused.
Ossoff proceeded to wipe the floor with Mike Collins the rest of the night. And at the end, Collins looked shellshocked from the onslaught.
In the first debate, a similar exchange took place. I simply can’t do it justice with words. You’ll have to watch it yourself.
The GOP is facing down their record all across the country right now, on debate stages and in town halls and campaign rallies. And something even bigger is taking hold of the GOP.
A Party That Gave Up
Georgia was supposed to be one of the Republican Party’s best chances to pick up a Senate seat this year. Trump won the state in 2024, and Ossoff is the only Democratic senator running for reelection in a state Trump carried.
Now, after Ossoff’s superior campaign, national Republicans have all but walked away. According to Politico, the Senate Leadership Fund, the party’s top Senate super PAC, didn’t spend a dime on broadcast television in Georgia last week, the first week it’s been off the air in the race. Ossoff leads by about eight points in the polling average and has more than $42 million in the bank. Collins has around $2 million.
It’s the same story in North Carolina, where that same super PAC spent roughly $32 million on Michael Whatley, watched him fall behind Roy Cooper, and then canceled its remaining ads. And it’s the same story in Texas, where Republicans now have to spend money just to protect Ken Paxton against James Talarico in a state they used to win in their sleep.
Republicans are panicking to rescue their party’s chances. Forget going on offense, they are now scrambling to hold red states where no race should be competitive.
But don’t think this is just about bad candidates, because that’s the explanation Republicans want you to believe. The truth is simpler: they earned this.
Donald Trump and the Republicans came into power promising to focus on the thing Americans cared about most: prices. Lower costs, starting on day one. That was the deal. It’s what a lot of people voted for, including plenty of people who didn’t much like Trump but were tired of paying more for groceries.
Instead, Donald Trump started a war of choice in the Middle East. It was supposed to last weeks. It’s dragged on for months, sent gas prices soaring, and cost American lives.
On the debate stage, Ossoff summed it up better than I can: “Folks can’t fill up a whole tank of gas, agriculture is getting crushed, everything is more expensive.”
On Capitol Hill, the GOP acted just as recklessly. A Republican Congress passed a tax bill that showered its biggest benefits on the wealthiest Americans, cut Medicaid for millions of people, and added trillions of dollars to the deficit our kids will inherit.
And if that wasn’t enough, the President of the United States turned the government into a personal business. Billions from crypto schemes. Pardons for donors. Thousands of stock trades in a single quarter, including in companies his own administration regulates.
None of that was forced on them. Every bit of it was a choice. And now the bill is coming due.
And you can tell how bad it’s gotten by listening to Republicans talk about each other.
“Republicans are already starting to blame each other as the midterm election spirals further out of their control,” Politico reported this morning. House Republicans are getting ready to blame the Senate side. Trump’s political aides are calling campaigns they think are underperforming. National operatives are quietly furious at candidates they say didn’t prepare. Candidates are blaming their own party committees. “If it happens,” said Republican Congressman Jeff Van Drew, “there will be plenty of blame to go around.”
At the top, it’s no different. According to Reuters, Trump himself is blaming his senior aides and political operatives, questioning how campaign money was spent, faulting the redistricting strategy, and second-guessing the candidates his own team picked. One senior House Republican told Politico the goal now is simply to “save as many Republican seats as we can.” Another said Republican candidates in newly redrawn districts in Texas and Florida are “hanging on with their fingernails.”
The Mirror
Did you notice what’s happening? The House is looking at the Senate. The aides are looking at the candidates. The candidates are looking at the committees. The President is looking at his staff.
Nobody is looking at the leader of the party, or at themselves.
I spent most of my adult life as a Republican. And when I told the truth about the direction the party was headed, I paid a price for it.
So I’ll say this to my former colleagues: a beating only does you any good if you learn from it. If Republicans lose big in November and spend the next two years blaming each other, the consultants, the media, or a rigged election, they’ll learn nothing, and they’ll lose again.
In Georgia, early voting is already open, and it’s open or opening in states across the country. Don’t assume the polls will hold, and don’t assume anyone else will show up for you. Make your plan. Vote early if you can. And bring someone with you.
The GOP has spent ten years refusing to look in the mirror. On November 3rd, we get to send a message they can’t ignore.
— Adam
My husband and I can't wait to vote for Talarico...today, or tomorrow at the latest!
It's about time Republicans are held accountable for their actions and rheteroic!