House leadership, possible Hegseth impeachment and RNC contest lie ahead
Republicans are weighing next steps after midterm losses that left them with their thinnest ranks on Capitol Hill in decades. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis described this week’s elections as an “extinction-level event” for the GOP, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz likened the result to a “Watergate-level repudiation,” and former Vice President Mike Pence called it a “reckoning.” The party has offered little agreement on how to proceed, and President Donald Trump’s role in shaping its future remains the central question.
When Republicans return to Capitol Hill next week, House Republicans will have to choose between Reps. Steve Scalise of Louisiana and Jim Jordan of Ohio to lead the party in the House. They may also weigh whether to impeach Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. Separate votes could come on defense spending and keeping the federal government open after Dec. 11.
Early discussions at the Republican National Committee are focused on limiting Trump’s influence in choosing the next chair. KC Crosbie, the committee’s co-chair, circulated a letter this week calling the midterms a “serious setback” and announcing plans to run for chair at the committee’s January meeting in Arizona. Trump announced his support Friday for the current chair, Joe Gruters.
Another contest is taking shape for the 2028 Republican presidential nomination. The Associated Press described Vice President JD Vance as a leading contender who would likely face a broad range of opponents if he entered the race. Stitt is among the Republicans calling for a “big open primary.” “I don’t think we should crown anybody,” he said.
The Associated Press identified two strategic risks for Republicans. It said a return to the bedrock fiscal and national security conservatism that defined the party under President Ronald Reagan could alienate the more hard-line conservatives welcomed into the party under Trump’s “Make America Great Again” banner. Leaning further into Trump’s politics, it said, could lead to more voter rejection.
Alex Latcham, executive director of the Senate Leadership Fund, which spent $810 million to support Republicans, said: “We have soul-searching to do. We need to first understand and honestly admit why we just endured a wipeout of this magnitude. And then we have to regroup and agree to a path forward.”
Trump’s role has been the central party question for the past decade. This year, he insisted on loyalty, intervened in Republican primaries and pressed voters to make the elections a referendum on his second term. He held dozens of rallies in the final weeks of the campaign for candidates, most of whom lost their races. Since Tuesday’s election, Trump has refused to acknowledge responsibility and has blamed the candidates. AP reported that his public events have focused on Washington projects that have proven unpopular with voters, and on Friday he elevated Stephen Miller, the architect of some of his most contentious policies, to White House chief of staff.
Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt, a Republican, called the election results “shocking” but said Trump could still steer the conversation around issues such as immigration. Stitt described the party’s current dynamic as a natural process for a party whose leader is deep in his second term. “It just tells you that the American people, after 10 years, they’re pretty much tired of whoever’s in office,” Stitt said. “I think people want a little more stability. They want people to be nice to people, to say, ‘Hey, we’re all Americans.’”
Longtime conservative commentator Tucker Carlson said the midterms marked “the end of the Trump era.” John Sununu, a Republican who lost his bid for a Senate seat in New Hampshire, blamed Trump. “It seems like he or his family is in on every transaction and deal that goes on in Washington,” Sununu told John Kasich, a former Republican congressman from Ohio, on SiriusXM. “Those two things, I think, caused people to say, ‘You know, I just can’t vote for a Republican while he’s still in office.’”
Republicans also face pressure to revive the coalition of voters, particularly Latinos, who lifted the party to success in previous elections but swung to Democrats this week. Former Rep. Carlos Curbelo of Florida said Secretary of State Marco Rubio is best positioned to win Latinos. “The two main constituencies that Republicans have to quickly regain are white suburban voters and Hispanic voters,” Curbelo said in an interview. “Vance was out on the campaign trail this year and it doesn’t appear that he was able to move the needle in terms of Hispanic voters.” A representative for Vance did not comment on that characterization.
According to The AP Voter Poll, an expansive survey of about 80,000 voters in all 50 states, younger Republican voters who supported the Republican candidate in their House race were less likely to approve of the way Trump was handling his job as president and more likely to say his policies worsened the economy. About two-thirds of Republican voters under 30 said they approved of how Trump was handling the presidency, compared with about 9 in 10 Republican voters age 65 and older. About one-third of younger GOP voters said Trump had worsened the country’s economic conditions, compared with about 2 in 10 older Republican voters.
The war with Iran also appeared to divide Republican voters. About 6 in 10 Republican voters under 45 said the United States made the right decision in taking military action against Iran, a share that rose to about 8 in 10 among Republican voters 45 and older. Young Republican voters were also more likely to call U.S. support for Israel “too strong.” Roughly half of Republican voters under 30 said the country’s backing of Israel was “too strong,” compared with about 1 in 10 voters 65 and older.
Despite optimistic public assessments from top Republicans including Trump and House Speaker Mike Johnson of Louisiana in the final weeks of the campaign, Republican strategists had long seen the country’s confidence in the party unraveling. In late August, the Senate Leadership Fund convened a donor retreat in Laguna Beach, California, where Latcham told the group that Republicans had lost voters’ confidence on handling the cost of living and the economy. Latcham’s assessment was reported by two Republican Senate campaign sources who attended the meeting and spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss a private gathering.
In defeat, Republicans are trying to take a broader view, knowing that it may take several election cycles before they one day return to power. Rep. Christopher Smith was reelected to his 24th term this week and is New Jersey’s last Republican in Congress. He took a long view on the party’s current struggles. “The pendulum swings back and forth,” he told reporters. “These are cycles.”