Congressional GOP in Trouble: The Bell Tolls for Thee

Can you believe it? Yet another round of elections was held yesterday — the Tuesday after Thanksgiving no less, which is just about as antisocial a moment to stage an election as you could imagine. Why not just hold the vote on Christmas Eve? (As a note of local pride, Chicago still tops this: the powers that be here have intentionally scheduled our mayoral election to fall in late February of an off-off year, ensuring turnout is at its lowest. The result: Brandon Johnson.)

I’ll start with the good news up front: Republican nominee Matt Van Epps defeated progressive Democrat Aftyn Behn in Tennessee’s seventh congressional district by a 54–45 percent margin. I’ll immediately follow up with the bad news: it should have been by a far higher margin than that, and even once you control for factors like the race’s curious timing, it bodes ill for the Republican majority next November. There’s no spinning the implications of last night. The electoral reaper beckons for the GOP, waiting for a midterm cull.

About the Author

Jeffrey Blehar

Jeffrey Blehar is a National Review staff writer living in Chicago. He is also the co-host of National Review’s Political Beats podcast, which explores the great music of the modern era with guests from the political world happy to find something non-political to talk about.

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Can you believe it? Yet another round of elections was held yesterday — the Tuesday after Thanksgiving no less, which is just about as antisocial a moment to stage an election as you could imagine. Why not just hold the vote on Christmas Eve? (As a note of local pride, Chicago still tops this: the powers that be here have intentionally scheduled our mayoral election to fall in late February of an off-off year, ensuring turnout is at its lowest. The result: Brandon Johnson.)

I’ll start with the good news up front: Republican nominee Matt Van Epps defeated progressive Democrat Aftyn Behn in Tennessee’s seventh congressional district by a 54–45 percent margin. I’ll immediately follow up with the bad news: it should have been by a far higher margin than that, and even once you control for factors like the race’s curious timing, it bodes ill for the Republican majority next November. There’s no spinning the implications of last night. The electoral reaper beckons for the GOP, waiting for a midterm cull.

About the Author

Jeffrey Blehar

Jeffrey Blehar is a National Review staff writer living in Chicago. He is also the co-host of National Review’s Political Beats podcast, which explores the great music of the modern era with guests from the political world happy to find something non-political to talk about.