‘Dead’: Josh Hawley Calls Midterms a ‘Funeral for the Republican Party’

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) donned his political coroner’s scrubs on Tuesday to declare the Republican Party “dead” as we have known it.

The Missouri senator was reacting to Tuesday’s midterms, where the huge gains Republicans hoped to make did not materialize. Instead of retaking the House with a sweeping majority, they are poised to control the chamber by just a handful of seats. Over in the Senate, Republicans failed to retake that body while Democrats could even net one seat, depending on next month’s runoff in Georgia.

There’s been plenty of finger-pointing among Republicans, most of it seems to be aimed at former President Donald Trump, who endorsed a slew of hardcore MAGA candidates, sometimes in moderate states such as Arizona, Michigan, and Pennsylvania where Republicans did poorly.

Hawley proffered his election postmortem to reporters at the Capitol on Monday:

I think that this election was the funeral for the Republican Party as we know it. The Republican Party is, as we have known it, is dead. And voters have made that clear. And in particular, the folks who did not vote for Republicans in this last election were independent voters – working-class independent voters – folks who voted for President Obama once upon a time, folks who then voted for President Trump, but stayed home this time. We are not a majority party unless we can appeal to those voters.

Republican senators met on Monday to decide whether to renominate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) to the position. He faces a challenge in the form of Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL).

After Tuesday, many Republicans have questioned Trump’s role in the party and whether he’d be a viable presidential candidate in 2024 when Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) is widely regarded by conservatives as a better bet, should he decide to run.