GOP 'naysayers' refuse to ditch Trump as others flee midterm disaster

President Donald Trump wearing a "happy Trump" pin speaks during a meeting with oil industry executives at the White House in Washington, D.C., January 9, 2026. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

Even as Republican candidates throughout the land politically distance themselves from President Donald Trump, a new report reveals that some in Trump's and the GOP's orbit are unwilling to publicly admit the potentially dire nature of their predicament.

"[The NRCC, or National Republican Congressional Committee,] points to extensive data that shows Democrats historically performing poorly in a host of the seats that were redrawn this year — including three in California and several in Texas and Florida," reported Politico's Andrew Howard and Aaron Pellish on Sunday. "For example, their data shows that the newly drawn Texas 35th District has never been carried by a Democrat in any race, even though the party is targeting it in November."

Howard and Pellish then quoted NRCC spokesperson Mike Marinella as saying, "The naysayers and bedwetters fail to recognize that Democrats promised the moon in California, and instead they’re being forced to fight tooth and nail across deep-red territory in states like Texas, Florida, North Carolina, Ohio, Tennessee, Louisiana, and Alabama."

Earlier in the article, the Politico reporters broke down how much of the GOP is panicking over their midterm prospects, as even having recently gerrymandered more than a dozen House seats does not seem to be yielding them the political benefits they had hoped for.

"Republicans did win the midterm mapmaking war and will likely net at least six seats via gerrymandering — but that’s less than half the number they’d initially hoped when they began the ambitious project over a year ago," Politico reported. "That’s largely due to the same political environment threatening GOP seats once thought safe across the map, with President Donald Trump’s approval rating hovering in the high-30s as the unpopular war in Iran continues to affect Americans’ pocketbooks."

They added, "Seats designed to be safe in Texas, Florida, Ohio and North Carolina are all still surprisingly competitive, leaving Republicans looking at smaller gains that came from southern state redraws. And on Friday, the Missouri Supreme Court delivered another blow when it blocked a one-seat GOP gerrymander from taking effect this year unless the U.S. Supreme Court intervenes."

To compensate for this apparent lower enthusiasm on the Republican side of the electorate, Trump recently announced that he is launching a series of commercials that make him front-and-center in GOP election campaigns. Two ads have already aired. Trump's position is that Republicans are more likely to turn out if they see him as the candidate, but some Republican strategists strongly disagree with that analysis.

"Well, I mean, this is political malpractice on an epic scale, because normally if you're, you know, a swing-seat Republican, what you're trying to do is make this anything other than a referendum on Donald Trump," right-wing commentator Charlie Sykes observed on Saturday. "If you make it a referendum on Donald Trump, you are in you're in deep s——. And so what is the message coming from the White House? It's got to be all about me. And next week they're having that midterm convention, that's going to be a s——show for the ages."

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