GOP leaders find culprit for Texas loss: It’s your fault, Republicans | Opinion
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Republican Leigh Wambsganss blamed voters and external factors after a 14-point loss.
- Blame‑shifting and ideological rigidity could damage future Republican prospects.
- Turnout collapse and candidate rigidity outweighed Trump endorsement and party efforts.
It’s understandable if Tarrant County and Texas Republican leaders didn’t quite know how to respond when they lost a state Senate race on longtime GOP turf Saturday. They don’t have much experience with defeat.
But surely they could have found a better example to follow than Mo Udall.
The former Arizona congressman ran for president in 1976 and came up short in the Democratic primaries. Accepting defeat, he famously said: “The voters have spoken — the bastards.”
Minus the name-calling, that’s pretty much the sentiment expressed over the surprising loss, from no one more than the Republican who got beat, Leigh Wambsganss.
The loss was so ugly, every Republican involved wants to step away from it, from the president down. A candidate typically takes the hit in public and grumbles in private about campaign consultants or circumstances such as the economy.
Not Wambsganss, who expressed no sense of humility or responsibility after losing by more than 14 points in a district where Donald Trump romped by 17 points just 15 months ago. She blamed GOP rival John Huffman, who finished third in the initial round of special-election voting. She blamed the weather. She blamed God.
But most of all, she blamed the voters, specifically her fellow Republicans. Candidates rarely go there, especially if they plan to ask for support again in less than a year, as Wambsganss does.
“The bottom line is, Republicans did not show up,” she told radio host Mark Davis (a Star-Telegram opinion contributor). Her misguided party mates “think Tarrant County is invincible, and it’s not.”
Yep, everyone involved, and even outside forces, was at fault. Everyone, that is, except Leigh Wambsganss.
Dan Patrick among those blaming voters for Tarrant loss
Perhaps it’s old-fashioned to expect a dose of humility from a politician. But if you’re going to ask donors, voters and volunteers to help you become an important leader in state government, you should take responsibility for a loss that literally bears your name.
She wasn’t the only one. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who invested considerable effort in Wambsganss’ campaign, lectured GOP voters that they “cannot take anything for granted.” Allen Blakemore, the consultant who runs campaigns for both, wrote on X that “Leigh did reach out to every Republican voter in SD 9. Unfortunately, about 61,000 Republicans did not turn out, and she lost by 14,000 votes.”
There’s a dropped beat after that discordant note, something Patrick and Blakemore cannot say because of the implications going forward.
It’s this: Wambsganss was a terrible candidate, the perfect culmination of a party drifting so far to the right that some candidates seem like caricatures based on opponents’ description of Republicans. She encapsulates political polarization: Partisans think the way to win is to be an ultra-distilled progressive or conservative and demand that voters move to them, not vice versa.
William F. Buckley said that conservatives should support the most conservative candidate who can win. Modern Republicans say that the party should nominate the purest candidate available and tell the voters: Take it or leave it.
Wambsganss clearly expected the Republicans who rejected her in the first round to move to her in the second, changing nothing about her message or approach. It was: Trump endorses me, the Democrat is a demon, where else ya gonna go?
Voters, though, still have choices. The first is to just stay home, and plenty did. That’s not unusual for a runoff, but this time, the dropoff in Republican turnout was breathtaking.
Another option is to vote for the other party, and plenty did. It’s hard for partisans to make that move but easier for independents, even those more ideologically aligned with her than with Democrat Taylor Rehmet.
Wambsganns never adjusted to the fact that health care and inflation, not the border and social issues, are top of mind for voters right now. Even as Rehmet relentlessly focused on those kitchen-table concerns, she offered little beyond what the narrowest part of the GOP base prefers.
When she finally figured out she was in trouble, she tried to tar Rehmet as too progressive for the district. He probably is, but just like smart politicians know not to blame the voters for their problems, they also know that you must define opponents before they can define themselves.
Even God was against the Patriot Mobile candidate?
But hey, don’t blame Wambsganss for all this. As she told Davis, it was God’s plan to deliver a crushing loss “because we, Texas, [do] need a wake up call.”
Poor Leigh. All that work to spread conservative Christian ideology in school boards, and God thanks her by making a losing example of her. Maybe Patriot Mobile, the company whose political efforts she helped lead, should donate to more churches and fewer PACs.
In spite of all this, Wambsganss is still likely to win the seat in November’s regular election. It remains Republican turf, and turnout will be much higher with crucial federal and state offices on the ballot.
A big loss, though, makes a candidate damaged goods. When that candidate’s response is to arrogantly declare that she bears no blame and that the voters need to do right by her, not the other way around, it’s hard to imagine that candidate is nimble enough to make needed changes.
Losing creates a stench. Consider that Trump allowed his name and social media accounts to be used to Wambsganss’ benefit and then, less than a day hours after it was clear she’d lost, declared the special election a local race that he knew little about.
Wambsganss might be better off if Trump pulls his endorsement. Not that it would help her win — if she does lose, she’d have one more person to blame.
After all, if she misses another political layup, it’s got to be the fault of anyone other than Leigh Wambsganss.
