Republican attorney general candidates outperformed other midterm GOP hopefuls in several key races, according to a post-election analysis from the Republican Attorneys General Association, which urged colleagues to view their role as the “front line” against leftist policies following results that were likened to a “category-five political hurricane.”
“America needs Republican Attorneys General now more than ever,” RAGA Executive Director Adam Piper wrote in a late-night memo to colleagues shared with Fox News Digital. “With an emboldened Democrat Congress, Republican AGs are both America’s front line and is the last line of defense when it comes to their left-wing wish list – such as court packing, the Green New Deal, Medicare for All, Second Amendment restrictions, and abolishing ICE.”
Piper, who has worked in Virginia and on the staff of South Carolina Gov.-elect Alan Wilson, noted midterm election results showed Republican attorneys general candidates holding up slightly better on ballots despite a difficult Tuesday night for the party.
AMERICA SAW THE BLUE WAVE COMING — BUT DRASTICALLY UNDERESTIMATED THE EXTENT OF THE DEM TSUNAMI
“Last night was the worst election night for the Republican Party in 50 years,” Piper’s memo began, acknowledging a difficult midterm “environment” that was ultimately made worse. “Last night, voters, regardless of party, preferred Democrat candidates by a mean of D +13.8 compared to D +7.9 in 2006 and D +8.4 in 2018.
“Today, we are dealing with the aftermath of a category-five political hurricane. It will take years to fully rebuild.”
As Republicans are picking up the pieces and evaluating the map overcome with blue, even along wide swaths of Texas’ southern border, the party is looking to the slight holds in Florida and any other silver linings.
Attorneys general might have something in the way of a pep talk for the party from Piper’s memo.
GOP AG candidates ran an average of 4.62 percentage points ahead of GOP Senate candidates in comparable states and 2.12 points ahead of Republican gubernatorial candidates, according to the returns as of the late Wednesday night memo.
Republican AG candidates posted better margins than GOP Senate candidates in nine of 10 comparable states and outperformed Republican gubernatorial candidates in nine of 13 states, Piper wrote.
STATE OF PLAY: BLUE WAVE SWEEPS DEMOCRATS INTO POWER, WITH KEY RACES STILL HANGING IN BALANCE
Still, Piper made clear that “there are no moral victories.” Republicans did lose five AG seats to Democrats in these midterms, compared to a projected net loss of 51 in the House and a potential net loss of nine Senate seats.
Iowa, Ohio and Colorado were among the widest outperformers. The Republican attorney general candidates in those states ran 9.3, 7.3 and 10.3 points ahead of their party’s gubernatorial candidates, respectively. In Colorado, the GOP attorney general candidate also outpaced the Republican Senate candidate by 7.7 points.
In Florida, now the largest red state with the handing over of Texas to the Democratic Party, Republican Attorney General James Uthmeier won by 1.8 percentage points, outperforming Gov.-elect Byron Donalds, who won by 1.3 points.
Nebraska Attorney General Mike Hilgers won re-election by 12.6 points, compared with a 6.7-point win for Republican Senate candidate Pete Ricketts and an 8.4-point victory for Republican Gov. Jim Pillen.
RAGA spent more than $40 million on these midterms, nearly twice its spending in 2022, and was on track to raise more than $50 million, according to Piper.
“No amount of outperformance can make up for the historical Republican losses,” his memo concluded. “RAGA will start to candidate recruit for 2027 and 2028 now and has set the expectation that we will continue to overperform, no matter the environment.”
