Former President Donald Trump (R) reportedly threw his wife Melania Trump under the bus Wednesday after the Pennsylvania U.S. Senate Republican nominee Dr. Mehmet Oz lost against the incredibly weak Democrat nominee, John Fetterman.
“Trump is indeed furious this morning, particularly about Mehmet Oz,” a quote in a Fox News report said, “and is blaming everyone who advised him to back Oz – including his wife, describing it as not her best decision.”
“There are people pushing Trump to reschedule his announcement next week, and several Rs have texted asking whether he will, but it’s risky and would be acknowledging he’s wounded by yesterday, something that some of his advisers insist is not the case,” the quote continued. “Worth remembering that Trump is a grown man who endorsed Oz over the objection of some of the people closest to him, and instead went beyond just endorsing and attacked Dave McCormick from the stage at a rally.”
Trump has spent the day blaming others for many of his key candidates either losing or struggling to win their races, including blaming the candidates themselves for not embracing conspiracy theories. He even celebrated Republicans losing a key U.S. Senate race.
The bulk of the winners in the races Trump endorsed came from safely Republican districts, with 16 of the candidates actually having run uncontested. Election results also show that 13 Trump-endorsed candidates lost in highly competitive or closely watched races. Of the 219 wins referenced by Trump, only around a dozen of those races were extremely competitive.
Trump has also spent the day trying to downplay the historic night that Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R) had in his re-election, suggesting that the votes he got in the presidential race were more impressive than the votes DeSantis got in a gubernatorial race even though DeSantis’ margin of victory was roughly 6X larger than Trump’s.
“Now that the Election in Florida is over, and everything went quite well, shouldn’t it be said that in 2020, I got 1.1 Million more votes in Florida than Ron D got this year, 5.7 Million to 4.6 Million?” Trump said on social media. “Just asking?”
Comparing turnout for midterm elections to turnout for presidential elections may not be instructive, as voter participation in presidential elections is always higher. A more useful comparison could be margin of victory.
In 2020, Trump won the state by 3.3 points or 371,686 votes. DeSantis won the state last night by 19.4 points or 1,507,081 votes
DeSantis won 62 of Florida’s 67 counties, including 59 counties by double digits. DeSantis won Miami-Dade County, the largest county in the state and a Democrat stronghold, by 11 points. He won Palm Beach County, the third largest county in the state and another Democrat stronghold, by three points.
Hank Berrien contributed to this report.