Vice President JD Vance said Wednesday that the Iran conflict was the main reason Republicans lost ground in the midterm elections.
He acknowledged that many voters who backed the Trump-Vance ticket in 2024 supported Democrats this time. High gas prices and legislative gridlock also left Republicans with few clear routes to victory, he said.
In a post, Vance said he had expected a difficult result but was still surprised by the scale of the loss. A pollster he spoke with had projected Republicans would lose the generic ballot by 13 points, and found that many former Trump voters were angry and considering voting for Democrats.
Asked what might bring those voters back, respondents most often cited ending the war, addressing the cost of living and inflation, putting America first, and changing the U.S. relationship with Israel.
Exit polling also indicated that the Iran conflict was a significant factor in voters’ decisions. Vance said those four concerns explained why some Republican voters crossed over to support Democrats.
Republicans continued to win white men, by 12 percentage points, but lost ground among Latino voters and other racial groups. Young men also shifted sharply toward Democrats, by 41 points.
The results suggest that voters who supported Trump and Vance in 2024 cannot be counted on to remain in the Republican coalition, even though some polls had found them more likely to trust Republicans on immigration and crime.
Vance said the war was the reason Republicans lost, adding that the president had made the same point the night before. He argued that anyone who believes the political cost was justified should say so plainly, and that an honest discussion of the party’s next steps has to begin with the conflict.
