Conservative media personalities are struggling to process Republicans’ crushing midterm defeat, and many are turning on one another.
“Delusion has become disbelief," wrote The Bulwark's Will Sommer. "Disbelief has become despair. And despair has become disgruntlement."
Few rode the rollercoaster harder than pro-Trump pundit Benny Johnson. As the first results came in Tuesday afternoon, he celebrated Republicans winning the governorship of Guam by 1,020 votes. “An island that knows a lot about blue waves just went Republican!” he posted.
Six hours later, as Democratic wins piled up, Johnson was complaining about the changing racial makeup of Texas. By Wednesday morning, he called the results “a meteor strike and an unmitigated disaster.”
By Wednesday evening, after a full day of posting and livestreaming about the election, Johnson said he didn’t care. “Notice how you don’t see any videos of Republicans bursting into tears, weeping and hysterical on social media after the loss?” he posted. “That’s because we have more to live for than party politics.”
Others couldn’t hide their frustration. On Piers Morgan’s election stream, libertarian comedian Dave Smith accused Jack Posobiec of misleading Republicans about the chances of an Iran peace deal, setting off a tense on-air clash, and activist James Lindsay called for his rivals on the right to be purged from conservative institutions.
Trump didn’t help. With the president spending Wednesday showing off construction of his White House ballroom, even loyalists piled on. “This is far worse than I anticipated,” Daily Wire podcaster Matt Walsh posted about the event.
Most influencers still avoided criticizing Trump directly, but instead, some came up with odd explanations for the loss. Podcaster Liz Wheeler argued that Republicans would have won if the Justice Department had arrested more “deep-state” operatives from the Biden administration.
The GOP’s collapse in Texas set off a wave of racial grievance. A Blaze pundit who goes by “Auron MacIntyre” asked, “Why import people you know are going to routinely vote against you?”
Laura Loomer may have had the most dramatic reaction. She tweeted that Americans should start learning Arabic to prepare for an Islamic takeover, said Trump’s America250 celebrations were an early funeral for the American dream and said she may have lost her faith in God.
On Wednesday, she found a grim silver lining, saying the elderly were the “bigger winners” of the night, because they would die soon.
“They won’t have to see the collapse of America,” Loomer said.