Trump's 2022 'weirdo candidates' prepare to run again – and are making GOP strategists sweat

Many Republicans last year blamed their disappointing midterm performance on former President Donald Trump's endorsements of fringe candidates who were willing to peddle his false claims about the 2020 election being "stolen" from him.

Even though many of those candidates went down in defeat last year, NBC News reports that some of them have already announced their intentions to run again -- and GOP strategists do not seem pleased.

Terry Sullivan, who served as Sen. Marco Rubio's (R-FL) 2016 campaign manager, lamented that there were "a lot of really crappy candidates last time," and he cast doubt on whether many of them could significantly improve.

"If you’re just a fundamentally flawed candidate the first time you run, you’re still a fundamentally flawed candidate the second time you run,” he said. “You’ve always had the weirdo candidates that run no matter what. And the difference now is, they’re kind of given more oxygen than they ever did in the past, and they’re actually winning primaries."

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One such candidate is JR Majewski, a QAnon-promoting, Trump-loving candidate who came under fire for allegedly lying about his military service and who has already announced his intention to run for Congress again.

One Ohio GOP strategist who spoke with NBC News said that party would "unquestionably" lose again if it made Majewski its nominee against Rep. Marcy Kaptur.

Washington's Joe Kent, who came under fire for his meetings with white nationalists, has also announced he will run for Congress again, and failed Arizona candidate Kari Lake has also strongly hinted about running for Senate next year.