On Wednesday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” MSNBC Senior Political Analyst Mark Halperin stated that the Georgia special election was a “disaster” for Democrats and proved that a referendum on President Trump won’t carry them to a majority.
Halperin said, “This is an unmitigated disaster for the Democrats, who are about an eighth of the way through Donald Trump’s term. We’re an eighth of the way through, and…most of the people in the liberal wing of the party think, of course, Donald Trump is a disaster. Everyone in the country hates him. Of course, everything’s going to be a referendum on him. This — there’s not a perfect. I don’t think Ossoff was that bad a candidate.”
He added that while Ossoff wasn’t a “perfect fit for the district,” he wasn’t running against “the best political of all time, the new Congresswoman-elect.”
Halperin continued, “the reason I think this is such a disaster for Democrats is, they put everything in, as you said. This was a race that they could have won, and they came up short. … Could they have recruited a better candidate than Ossoff? The problem is, it’s easy to say–if you’ve got a strong party–we’re going to recruit candidates to match the district. But, the liberal wing of the party is ascendent. And so, in a lot of the primaries that are coming up, that’ll determine who their nominees are, they can’t recruit and be sure they’re going to get nominees who are the perfect fit. They’re going to get a lot of liberal nominees, a lot of nominees who are maybe too liberal to win.”
Halperin did note that there was a silver lining, “Ossoff wasn’t the perfect candidate, but he was a strong candidate in fundraising. He was a strong candidate in enthusiasm. He proved to be pretty able on the campaign trail.”
He concluded, “They, I think, have to look at this and say, the main takeaway for me is, if the liberals think that a referendum on Trump is going to carry them to the majority, last night proved that’s just not the case.”
(h/t Grabien)
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
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