Not So Fast: MAGA Media Celebrates Primary Wins, But Extreme Candidates Are on Track to Get Smoked in General

Mario Tama/Getty Images
As primary season starts to wrap, a reactive media narrative has revealed itself on cable news: Republican voters in many states have put forth the more extremist and MAGA-friendly candidate to represent the GOP in the general election. What that narrative overlooks, however, is just how poorly many of these candidates are faring in general election polling.
There is little question that former President Donald Trump still holds immense power over the Republican Party. Since leaving the White House, he’s been on a warpath to see every Republican in the House of Representatives that voted to impeach him lose their primary. In a Tuesday night post on Truth Social, he crowed about Rep. Peter Meijer losing to John Gibbs (who he endorsed), saying, “Not a good time for Impeachers – 7 down, 3 to go! Thank you Michigan!”
“A big night for Trump-backed candidates,” Fox Business anchor Maria Bartiromo announced Wednesday morning, ticking off the list of MAGA candidates who took down their mainstream Republican opponents. Many others on conservative-leaning outlets predictably voiced similar sentiments which are too numerous to cite.
The story of Trump’s influence on these Republican primary elections is a legitimate one. But it only tells half of the story — or more like 25% of the story, depending on the actual size of Trump’s base. The other and more telling part of this political narrative? The majority of extremist far-right and MAGA-friendly candidates look likely to get smoked by Democrats in the general election in November.
Of course, relying on early polling is a dangerous game that often backfires, which might very well be the case here. But there is a clear trend worth observing: Trump-friendly candidates are not looking very electable in the general.
State gubernatorial races are probably the best example. Pennsylvania gubernatorial candidate Doug Mastriano is so pro-Trump that he organized busses to the Capitol on January 6 and attended the events on that day himself. With some help from the Democrats who supported his campaign as a political play, he won the GOP nomination. The most recent PA poll, however, has him down double digits to Democrat Josh Shapiro.
A similar story can be told of Maryland gubernatorial candidate Dan Cox, who also went to DC on January 6 and benefitted from Democratic campaign dollars designed to boost an extremist. No polls have been released between Cox and Democrat Wes Moore, but it would be very difficult to find even a conservative pollster that realistically thinks an extremist candidate like Cox would win the statehouse in such a blue state.
Perhaps the most watched Republican state primary is still unfolding in Arizona, where pro-Trump Kari Lake appears ready to win the primary against “guns, God and GOP” promoter Karrin Taylor Robson. Lake is, of course, the election-denying and the premature victory-claiming candidate who has curiously (and baselessly) called out electoral fraud in a race she appears to be winning.
But the most recent polls show she is 9 points behind the Democratic candidate Katie Hobbs.
Senate races don’t tell a much better story for Trump’s candidates. Herschel Walker is down to Rev. Raphael Warnock (though only by three points), and Mehmet Oz is down to John Fetterman by double digits. One would be hard-pressed to find more Trump-friendly candidates than celebrity candidates like former football player Walker and TV doctor Oz.
Republican chances to take over the Senate have become so cloudy that Nate Silver’s FiveThirtyEight switched its projection to forecast, for the first time this election cycle, that the Democrats will keep the U.S. Senate.
Look, there is no question that Trump’s influence over the Republican Party is unparalleled. He remains the leader of the GOP. Don’t overlook, however, that the vast majority of candidates running on a Trump agenda look like losers…of the eventual general election.
This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.