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You are here: Home / Economics / C.R.E.A.M. / Repubs In Disarray! Open Thread: Schadenfreude (At the RNC)

Repubs In Disarray! Open Thread: Schadenfreude (At the RNC)

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Falling into the pit they have gleefully dug. Per Politico:

Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel rallied major donors Wednesday to get behind the GOP’s efforts to flip the Senate — a plea that comes amid rising concerns in the party over its candidates’ lagging fundraising totals and its overall prospects.

During a 36-minute conference call, a recording of which was obtained by POLITICO, McDaniel argued that the party has strong Senate candidates and a favorable political environment. But she went on to say that Republican candidates are being swamped by Democrats in the chase for campaign cash. The Supreme Court’s June decision nixing Roe v. Wade, McDaniel said, triggered a gusher of online donations for the opposition.

McDaniel – who was joined by former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, the architect of the party’s House takeover in the 1994 midterm election – also said Republican small donors had been “decimated” by the lagging economy. That’s made the GOP more dependent on large contributors, such as those on the call, to compete against Democrats on the air in the final weeks before the election, she said…

Republican officials say the RNC hosts such calls every few months to provide updates to major givers. The call comes as Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and other top Republicans are mobilizing to close the financial gap. McConnell has spent August working the phones to raise money from major donors, according to a person familiar with the conversation.

Some senior Republicans have privately grown bearish on the party’s hopes of winning the majority, particularly in light of its growing fundraising woes. An array of candidates in key races — from Arizona’s Blake Masters to Ohio’s J.D. Vance to Pennsylvania’s Mehmet Oz — have found themselves badly outraised by their Democratic opponents. (At one point in the call, an Arizona donor noted that Masters’ rival, Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly, is flooding the airwaves and made an appeal for other participants to help Masters.)…

During a question-and-answer session, Republican mega-donor Steve Wynn asked whether there are any dark-money nonprofits that contributors could give to. Unlike political action committees, those groups aren’t required to disclose their donors.

Some donors, Wynn said, “are self-conscious for reasons that are personal to them, business people and folks like that” and would rather give anonymously…

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Reader Interactions

60Comments

  5. 5.

    pacem appellant

    I like to see Dems pressing their advantage. My whole life I’ve had to endure Democrats running away from the very things they stand for. Even with old man Joe at the helm, the younger Dems are much louder and prouder than their forebears, and it’s energizing to see.

  6. 6.

    SiubhanDuinne

    I know it’s childish of me, but I wish reporters would routinely identify the RNC Chair as “Ronna Romney McDaniel” (“Romney McDaniel” for second cite is fine).

  9. 9.

    jackmac

    Hey Republicans.  Listen to defeated House candidate and lunatic Laura Loomer when she said:

    “Your vote literally doesn’t count in America anymore.”

    Now stay home.

  10. 10.

    pacem appellant

    @dmsilev: Apropos of Oz, I have a question for any native New Jerseyans out there: Do you call a raw vegetable platter crudité? I ask because, well, I do. I always have. My mother and grandmother called them that, so I do, too. And they’re from New Jersey and very working class.

    However, I grew up in California, so maybe it’s something from the West Coast that I share in common with carpet-bagger Oz?

  14. 14.

    Scout211

    Mega donors are slowly peeling away from Trump. It seems the RNC has made some mistakes by going all in on Trump.  Apparently, the owner of the SF Giants made news by donating to DeSantis. Link

    San Francisco Giants principal owner Charles B. Johnson — a Republican mega-donor who has been criticized for some of his recent contributions — may be primed to back Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis over former President Donald Trump in a 2024 GOP presidential primary.

    Johnson has donated nearly $500,000 to Friends of Ron DeSantis since January 2021, Florida state election records reviewed by SFGATE show. The organization is a state-registered political committee with no restrictions on donation limits; Johnson also gave it $275,000 ahead of DeSantis’s successful 2018 run for governor of Florida.

    . . .

    Johnson is one of a handful of wealthy conservative donors to have possibly jumped ship. Billionaire Walter Buckley gave more than $1.5 million to Trump Victory prior to the 2020 election; since Nov. 2021, he’s given $1.25 million to DeSantis. Billionaire businessman John W. Childs dispersed six-figure checks to both Trump and DeSantis prior to the 2020 election, but has only recently given another big donation to DeSantis ($200,000 in March 2022). And Miami Dolphins owner Stephen Ross, who held a controversial Trump fundraiser in 2019, gave $100,000 to DeSantis in April 2022. None have donated to Trump since 2021.

  19. 19.

    CaseyL

    After 2016, in a news article, someone said that Trump voters “came out of the woodwork” to vote for him – meaning they had previously not been voting, not been involved in politics.  All those half- or wholly-crazed, ignorant, spiteful, horrible horrible people only came out for Trump, because Trump was one of them, and he was rich and famous.  (“If he can do it…” since hardly a one of them knows, or believes, Trump was born rich.)

    I would love nothing better than for them to go back into the woodwork they came out of.  Like, yesterday.  Yes: please boycott all elections from now on, Trumpers, because your god isn’t on the ballot.

  20. 20.

    Scout211

    Go Gavin! Link

    CNN)California Gov. Gavin Newsom is sending money across the country to help Rep. Charlie Crist defeat Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis this November.

    The California Democrat on Thursday tweeted that he was pledging $100,000 to make DeSantis a “one-term governor” and he called on his supporters to donate to Crist, who won the Democratic nomination to be Florida’s governor on Tuesday.

    Asked about the donation during a Los Angeles event, Newsom said he was compelled to donate to Crist because “I don’t like bullies.” Newsom pointed to DeSantis’ verbal assault of Dr. Anthony Fauci at a rally Wednesday, during which the Republican leader said of the country’s top infectious disease expert, “Someone needs to grab that little elf and chuck him across the Potomac.”

    “To call someone pejorative terms because they’re short — who the hell raised these guys?” Newsom said. “What kind of people are they? I know all of us had to sit there and suck it up and take (Donald) Trump’s demonization but not everybody has to act like him. I mean, literally, I remember growing up and folks would have their mouths washed out with soap if they talked like this. I got four kids; I don’t want these guys being models.”

  29. 29.

    Rob

    Don’t threaten me with a good time. Yes, Republicans, please stay home on election day. Even here in Maryland where the Democrats will almost certainly win anyway.

  30. 30.

    pacem appellant

    @No One You Know: @dm: @HumboldtBlue: Must have been a quirk of my family then. I’m not running for political office or filming myself shopping, but if I do either of those things, I’ll remember to call them veggies and not mispronounce Trader Joe’s.

  31. 31.

    bbleh

    @dm: [clasps face in horror] Oh dear Lord, young man, nobody ever considered a train line going into … [pauses to collect self] … New Jersey to be anything “main.”

    The Main Line was the Pennsylvania Railroad, which first linked Atlantic ports — and in particular Philadelphia — with the Ohio River and via that the great economic opportunity of the midwestern then-frontier, to compete with which the (filthyscumgangcriminals) leaders of (corruptarrivistePhilistines) New York developed the Erie Canal.

  33. 33.

    gene108

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    I know it’s childish of me, but I wish reporters would routinely identify the RNC Chair as “Ronna Romney McDaniel” (“Romney McDaniel” for second cite is fine).

    I remember Hillary Clinton catching flak about using her maiden name and wanting to be called Hillary Rodham Clinton, in the 1990’s, from conservatives.

    Conservative women shouldn’t benefit from the work of people they despise, who advance women’s rights. Amy Coney Barrett should be addressed as Mrs. Jesse Barrett. Or at least quit trying to copy Hillary, with Coney in her name and just go with Amy Barrett.

  34. 34.

    Mike in NC

    Seems like the Turtle might come to regret his gloating about a nationwide abortion ban. Who the hell advises him on this stuff?

  40. 40.

    JanieM

    @bbleh:  That brings back memories. I grew up in Ashtabula, Ohio, a town on Lake Erie that was criss-crossed by railroad tracks. My Italian immigrant grandfather was a locomotive mechanic. When I was growing up (50s and 60s), the two main railroad companies were the New York Central and the Pennsylvania Railroad. (The Nickel Plate came through too.) Within my time there, IIRC, the two big ones merged and became Penn Central.

    Also, iron ore and coal came in via the lake and was loaded into train cars to be taken to the steel mills in Youngstown and Pittsburgh.

    So many memories.

    ETA: Corrected the bbleh link. Linked to the wrong comment the first time.

  41. 41.

    pacem appellant

    @HumboldtBlue: I am VERY Californian. I didn’t even know about that supermarket chain until this hullabaloo erupted. So yes, I’ll be shopping there exclusively.

    I can’t even think of an equivalent for the Bay Area. Trader Albertsons? Safeway Joe’s? I guess you could mix up Andronico’s with Zanotto’s and get Zanonico’s, which is kinda fun.

  42. 42.

    bbleh

    Re OP, personally, because I respect the way in which Republican voters do their own research, think through the issues with their friends, and ultimately decide what is best not only for themselves but America, that if they decide they should stay home because of the fundamental unfairness of the voting system, they have not only the right but the DUTY to do so!

  48. 48.

    dr. luba

    @HumboldtBlue: That is so cool.  I attended a Zoom implicit bias training session today (Michigan license renewal requirement), and the lack of appropriate hair in dolls of color was brought up, particularly Barbies!

  51. 51.

    eddie blake

    @Ken B: pretty sure the neocons thought if they had men and materiel in afghanistan and iraq, they could squeeze iran in a vice and ramp up hostilities, harrying iran from both flanks.

    they used to have a saying, “real men go to tehran.”

    iirc, their goal was a wholesale reshaping of the world

    eta- i think that’s why we were there for 20 years. the blob didn’t wanna give up their foothold.

  53. 53.

    geg6

    @JanieM:

    Railroad stuff is so cool.  A couple of guys were childhood/teenage friends of mine.  Their dad was the president of a railroad.  But it had only about 30 miles or so of track.  Barges of raw materials for steel would be off loaded onto his railroad cars and they delivered to the various steel mills along the Ohio River here in Beaver County, PA between the Emsworth Lock and Dams and the Montgomery Lock and Dam.  Mr.Smith was not a tycoon though.  Just solidly upper middle class.

  54. 54.

    Geminid

    Republican disaffection helped put Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff in the Senate. Historically, Republican turnout in Georgia runoffs exceed Democratic.  But that time, the drop off in Republican vote was over twice as great as for Democrats. Observers credited this to trump supporters taking their anger out on the establishment’s Senate candidates.

    I don’t think Republicans are adding voters, so they surely can’t afford to lose many in purple states and districts.

  55. 55.

    JanieM

    @geg6:

    Railroad stuff is so cool.

    For sure. I took the train from Ashtabula to LA when I was 11 with my grandma and two of her old Italian lady friends — the greatest adventure of my childhood.

    When we finally got the Downeaster in Maine in 2001 and I rode it to Boston, it made me cry. (Just a little bit. ;-) )

  56. 56.

    Geminid

    @eddie blake: I think Cheney and Rumsfeld thought that after they successfully wrapped up the Iraq war, they would move on to the next member of the “axis of evil,” Iran. Instead of quick win in Iraq, they got bogged down in fighting an insurgency. But their plan, I believe was to move on and “settle” Iran and North Korea by means of America’s superior air power.

  58. 58.

    eddie blake

    @Geminid:  bremer’s firing of the army practically insured an insurgency.

    but yeah, i figure the idea was to crack iran like a nut between the forces ensconced in the flanking countries. it’s sound strategy and has the benefit of being precedented. that’s how germany was beaten in both world wars

    eta-they might’ve been able to bomb n korea back to the stone age, they’re not too far removed in the first place, but they wanted the oil in iran. no way they get that without boots on the ground in  a considerably larger footprint. iran is fucking huge.

  60. 60.

    KenK

    @JanieM: Interesting. I grew up same decade(s) south of you in Tuscarawas County. My grandfather was a wreck train master for the Pennsylvania RR out of the Dennison, OH roundhouse. It was the PRR repair facility between Columbus and Pittsburgh.

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