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TPM Reader BB has his own take on JD Vance’s struggles in Ohio …
I am not the long-time resident of Ohio that RJ is, but I live outside of Cincinnati, and one thing that has been striking to me (and might explain the Senate Leadership Fund ad buy) is the degree to which Vance just disappeared from the airwaves after the primary. I have seen constant ads from Tim Ryan, both talking about himself (working class Ohioan, agreed with Trump on trade, not about parties… basically what you would expect from a smart Democrat trying to win in Ohio) and bashing on Vance (elite snobbish fake from San Francisco, does not care about Ohioans just his political career, etc.). Only within the last couple of weeks have I seen a single TV ad from Vance, basically his wife talking about what a nice guy he is and how she hopes Ohio will give him a chance, which is invariably followed by several Ryan ads with cops and military vets talking about how much Vance sucks. It has just been a remarkably one-sided affair. I assume that at least part of the problem is a lack of money on Vance’s part, though it is odd that I have not seen ads from outside groups, either. Maybe overconfidence on their part?
Tim Ryan still very much has his work cut out for him in Ohio. His lead is modest and all the partisan muscle memory in the state is Republican. But there are some broader patterns we can note.
I saw one election analyst today saying how in multiple races Republicans had ceded the airwaves to Democrats through the late spring and summer. The one who mentioned this pointed to Wisconsin where Ron Johnson could have spent the whole primary beating up on and defining Mandela Barnes. He still can and they’ve just started in on him now. But that’s critical time lost for really no reason. Another said that after the comical pratfalls of 2010 and 2012 Republicans had gotten really good at candidate recruitment and weeding out crazies – true. Then in 2022 they just stopped doing that.
These are all good points. But there’s a broader pattern. First, churlish as it may be to say, if all your candidates are struggling, it’s probably not a wave year for your party. Maybe I’m out on a limb here. But that would be my take. But I think what we’re seeing here is that for the last year Republicans (and frankly many Democrats too) have been operating on the assumption that history, inflation and COVID fatigue guaranteed a GOP wave in which it hardly mattered what candidate you ran. As for pummeling Democrats during their primaries, how much money do you need to spend defining Democrats who are about to go down to 10 point to 20 point margin defeats?
I do not want to be guilty of the same overconfidence I’m mocking. Republicans are still favorites to win at least the House. But Republicans have spent upwards of a year seeing the 2022 midterm as all but a formality and foregone conclusion. You can see that in candidate recruitment, candidate spending decisions and even candidate vacation policies. Inflation was their silver bullet. They took the election mostly for granted. And when the tide began to shift, even if only to a limited degree, they weren’t really prepared for it.
