Supporters attend a watch party for Republican US Senate candidate and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton during US midterm elections in Dallas, Texas, US, November 3, 2026. REUTERS/Callaghan O'Hare
As Election Night wore on, Republicans discovered that the oldest political sacrament — denial — does not survive contact with a vote count. As the returns turned against them, those who gleefully embrace the religion of "owning the libs" slowly crumpled in real time as their overconfidence turned to a liturgy of coping.
As the crowd dwindled at Ken Paxton's "victory party," a group of white men huddled together, arms around each other, praying.
Finally, it appeared they simply couldn't take it anymore and turned off the Fox News feed.
In the northern U.S., Vivek Ramaswamy's crowd also emptied out like a fire drill as it became clear he would suffer the predicted humiliating loss. One video showed a young white man in a suit, as the tallies came in, screaming obscenities while Michael Jackson's "Beat It" played loudly. The young man's friend's face fell into his hands and he rubbed his eyes.
Even Fox News struggled. Just after the South Carolina Senate race was announced for Annie Andrews (D), host Sean Hannity was "on the verge of tears," one person described.
When asked to respond, he called it "brutal." He then said that Graham was "asked to serve" and did her part, but hadn't even mourned her brother and attributed that and her inexperience to the loss.
Laura Jedeed was doing a running thread on BlueSky about what she was hearing on Real American Voices, the pro-Trump streaming news network.
As polls were closing, Steve Bannon was claiming things were "looking great" for the GOP. They were using Kalshi betting markets to support their thoughts, not actual polling, exit poll numbers or even turnout.
They claimed that since Kalshi moved from blue to red in Iowa, Alaska, Kansas, Michigan, Ohio, Maine and Texas all within ten minutes of each other, it was a sign. Bannon, Jedeed said, made his guest explain Kalshi several times so that his audience could "understand" that it "is a great source for predictions." Jadeed added that it is not. Bannon would find out why as the hours moved on.
"We're fully in the 'everything is fine' section of tonight's program," Jadeed said at about 7:25 p.m. EST. "Texas is fine. Virginia is fine. Kentucky is fine. Maine is fine. Ken Paxton is fine because the huge Hispanic early voting turnout all voted for Paxton."
"There are indicators that things are not, however going very well. Every time Steve Bannon calls on somebody to go over the actual statistics, they sound like they're sweating through their vocal cords. It is hilarious," she added.
Then John Ossoff's race was called. She said that they then appeared to be seeing how tight Florida races were looking, including for governor. While former Rep. David Jolly lost on Tuesday, all of the House seats that Republicans redrew to try and get rid of Democrats failed to get rid of Democrats.
They quickly began to hear word that the Latino vote abandoned the GOP and Jedeed said that they spent several moments speculating on "why that might be." The group tried to claim that the reason was gas prices.
"The Bannonite wing wants you to know that the Republicans are losing Hispanic votes and the votes of young men because they are mad about gas prices. They are definitely not mad about the deportations or anything like that. It's the economy. Once the Iran War ends, everything will be fine," said Jedeed.
At some point, RAV stopped listing any election results at all as they searched for "good news." They "still can't really find any good news to report. They just keep repeating that it's all because of the economy and the Iran war and we can get these voters back. It's OK, it's OK, it's OK."
By 9:48 p.m. Jedeed reported, "Steve Bannon sounds straight up suicidal."
