control of the House and Senate still hanging in the balance at this hour many in the GOP of
course thought this election would be a big red wave many in the Democratic party did as well but
that is not what has materialized and now some in the GOP are pointing the finger squarely at
former president Trump who endorsed so many of the candidates on the ballot some of his highest
profile candidates including Dr Oz in Pennsylvania lost joining me now retiring Republican senator
Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania who just saw Democrats flip his seat that was the seat at stake that John
fetterman will now occupy Senator Toomey thank you so much for being with me so you know as you
watched this from a perspective that a perspective of one only you really could see this uh the way
you did right it was your former seat you know your state so well why do you think Oz lost
uh well it's actually still my seed for another couple of months but uh I get the point look
um first of all let me let me be very clear I think Dr Oz ran a very good campaign I actually
think he was a very good candidate uh in a lot of ways um so my the question that I think arises is
why did a good candidate running a good race in what should be a very good environment
not Prevail in a state like Pennsylvania which is very very competitive always close
or almost always close and I think the big part of the reason was that at the top of the ticket
in the gubernatorial race we had an ultra Maga candidate who never appeared to even attempt
to expand Beyond a hardcore base that was very very committed to him but he ended up losing in
an epic Beatdown and it's very very hard for candidates who are down ballot and Dr Oz you
know so our govern our gubernatorial Republican lost by like 14 points Dr Oz kept his race to
within three it's it's really hard when that's what's happening by the way we had three House
Seats that I thought we had a very good chance of picking up in Pennsylvania we lost all three
of those and again I think it was a combination of a real problem at the top of the ticket but also
president Trump inserting himself into the race he came to Pennsylvania you know late I think
it was the Saturday before the election rallied with Osmond it was never going to be helpful yeah
he well he he was yeah I mean mastriana was his big interest but but still the point is we were
in a moment we were in a cycle we were at a time when it's good for Republicans for the race to
be about President Biden who is not popular whose policies have failed and instead president Trump
had to insert himself and that changed the nature of the race and that created just too much of an
obstacle and by the way it's not just Pennsylvania you look all over the country there's a very high
correlation between Maga candidates and big losses or at least dramatically underperforming I mean
it is amazing though Senator you look at it that's the truth you're going through three house races a
gubernatorial race and a senate seat five crucial races that that can be put on the doorstep from
your analysis of former president Trump I mean that that's a pretty terrible record add to that
you need to add to that uh control of the general assembly in our state capital of Harrisburg uh
we're probably going to lose control of of the state house which Republicans have had for some
time um so yeah so this is a huge problem and I think my party needs to um face the fact that
if uh fail tea to Donald Trump is the primary criteria for selecting candidates we're probably
not going to do really well so is this going to break the Trump fever I mean I say it and
I you know I guess incredulously a bit but I mean you know we keep hearing oh this will be it this
will be it here we are losses after losses after losses handed to your party will that be enough
so here's my theory on the case is that there is not going to be one discreet moment at which
the fever breaks and Donald Trump becomes irrelevant that's not likely to happen what
I think is his influence wanes and a debacle like we had across the country Tuesday night
from a republican point of view accelerates the pace at which that influence wanes you
know there are some interesting data points already um a year or two ago if you asked
Republican voters do they consider themselves more traditional Republicans or Donald Trump
Republicans he had a huge lead that has flipped and that's telling I think and
I think that's going to continue well Senator I really appreciate your time and and you're
taking you know the time to to share your your thoughts and the Nuance with us I appreciate it
thanks for having me all right Senator Toomey as he said it's still Senator here of course
until until the new year everyone's back with me now so interesting yeah you know and and and
not afraid look he's he's not he's always been a moderate he's not afraid to to make his point here
um but he's talking about if if this doesn't break the fealty what will
I I think he is being too cautious about that look I mean Pat toomey's I wouldn't call Modern he ran
Club for Growth but he is in the era of trump he has stood up to Trump in a principled modern way
and worked with Joe manchin on issues and you know been a responsible conservative senator
from the Keystone State yes look I I think um he called out trumpism for what it is it's the
toxic mold of American politics when it comes to moderates and and and we saw that again last night
um but well to me deserves a great deal of credit for calling out Trump consistently and saying this
guy is a loser for our party he has a drag on the ticket there's the um the underlying assumption
that you know this fever is going to break slowly that everything's basically fine that Trump's an
aberration there's not a lot of evidence for that right now I think instead there is a moment where
Trump is wounded because people recognize how how dangerous he is or divisive he is
and how how bad he is for close elections even in the midterm but now Republicans have to step
up and start filling that void including and especially folks who want to run for president
because otherwise it will revert to the mean we've seen this movie before two weeks after January 6th
Kevin McCarthy from the grab them the grab them tape all the way on I mean John it's amazing
though you know and to me I I like how he you know elaborated on what I was saying right he's
three House Seats Governor's seat senator's seat and he was clear to point out the state
house in Harrisburg I mean that's just like being punched 50 times right they lost everything so the
argument you always hear from the mega people is it reminds me of like the salesman who says
sure we lose money on every sale but we'll make it up in volume right they seem to think that that
the Maga candidates because their passion their intent their support from it is so intense it will
outweigh the numerical superiority of the people who don't like it and we saw this in this election
look I mean Joe Biden has every right to to celebrate you know what happened on Election night
but his approval rating you know was not good this was an anti Trump party Coalition more than it was
a pro-biden coalition at least at the margins and um and there are other things going on as
well and so I don't know if it's likely that this spells the end of trump but I do know that it's
never been it hasn't been this possible for a very long time and it's going to require institutional
actors to step up and figure out how to do this a lot of it depends on how DeSantis handles things a
lot of it depends if Trump announces on the 15th and it looks like it's going to hurt the Georgia
runoff if it's going to hurt Herschel Walker that could be the kind of thing that erodes even more
support for this entire approach to politics and instead I mean it looks like that is going ahead
this 15th announcement yeah it does look like it's going ahead and I do think it'll be interesting to
see what the response is to that we know that before election day happened Donald Trump was
basically looking at all of the Republican kind of uh uh the Republican leaders to see if they were
going to pre-endorse them for 2024. they thought that this was going to be a coronation after
after a republican wave driven by Donald Trump that will lead him directly to the nomination I
think we are already seeing that that's not going to happen even if he does announce on the 15th
there is a lot of other Republican candidates that see this as their window the problem is if
the base if the if the voter is with them because Donald Trump did not make these people and they
make his voters believe and he wasn't dictating beliefs they actually reflected a lot of those
beliefs I think excited election denialism so will where is the truth yeah you can't sell somebody
something they don't want to be absolutely so will those new candidates that come up out of
this will will they reflect those same grievances that Donald Trump has or will they try to Pivot in
a different more moderate Type of Way well that's still open the question and he'll be making the
announcement in Mar-A-Lago in Florida yeah the the the the the the state the loan site of the great
Republican victory such that there was one in this cycle which was Ron desantis's reelection yeah
I'm not one for giving Republicans uh political advice but I will say I I think that if Donald
Trump announces to John's point and there are other candidates that step up the more that step
up the better Donald Trump's chances are because you see 30 of the Republican party I still think
are magro Republicans extreme Republicans I mean they still did vote for some of these candidates
and some of them still did win and could still win so you have that part of the base and then if
you get a Kemp a junkan an Abbott um a DeSantis seventy percent of your party might split four
ways and then does Trump prevent you just set up a debate stage right there I did all right