All the votes in the VA-05 Republican primary are finally counted and the loser is neo-fascist incumbent Bob Good. The one who didn’t lose was challenger— also a neo-fascist— state Sen. John McGuire, who had been endorsed by a vengeful Señor T and financed by a vengeful Kevin McCarthy. The final results:
John McGuire: 31,557 (50.3%)
Bob Good: 31,184 (49.7%)
Just 373 votes… mostly due to Good’s underperformance in Pittsylvania Co. and in Danville. Like Republican losers have been taught to do by Trump, Good has been crying foul and insisting that the vote was somehow rigged against him. Unlike trump though, Good doesn’t have any widespread support inside the GOP for his baseless accusations. Yesterday, Andrew Solender and Juliegrace Brufke reported that one of his colleagues— on the condition of anonymity— noted that “No one is buying it, but all understand this is one of the several stages of electoral grief… [Good's assertion of election irregularities is] the reflexive thing people who can't accept loss say these days.” Um… no, not “people,” Republicans.
Like Trump once did, Good is has already started demanding a “do over” and he's already begging for money from his followers for his legal costs. He quickly ran to Bannon’s podcast to rant and rave about blocking certification of the results. And he sent out a statement claiming that “The people of our district are reaching out to our campaign demanding that we pursue a recount. Our donors, our volunteers, and our supporters expect it… We will pursue the recount to settle any questions about the fairness or transparency of the election process. This way, voters can confidently move forward to the general election.”
Other Republicans were happy to piss on his political grave. Derrick Van Orden: “[Of] course Bob is claiming election fraud. He is grasping at straws to help save his political career... If Bob had spent more time working for America and less time trying to dictate to other members of Congress how we could vote for our constituents, we would not be having this conversation. He is a bully and it is time for him to go.” Mike Lawler: “What a loser!” Another Republican told Solender “Fuck Bob Good Bob Good is a sore loser. His defeat strengthens our majority.” Another said Good is “full of shit.”
The former congressman from the district, Denver Riggleman, summed it up best: “I don't find it surprising that an election between an election denier and an election denier would end with one of them denying the election was fair based on conspiracy theories.”
Meanwhile, the ultimate sore loser— and role model for all Republican sore losers— is already whining that tomorrow’s debate is fixed and rigged against him. Flipping out that Biden’s anemic polling numbers are going up and his own are headed down, he and his rancid team are fighting with CNN, either to lower expectations, set up an excuse for his likely loss, or even set up an excuse for backing out of the debate at the last second! He’s insisting the CNN hosts his campaign agreed to, Jake Tapper and Dana Bash, are anti-Trump, who’ll be live fact-checking both candidates.
In one of his standup comedy routines, Trump claimed that if Biden loses the debate, the Democrats will replace him. So Trump, high on drugs as usual, said “I'll make sure he stays. I'll lose the debate on purpose, maybe I'll do something like that.” Yesterday, Hillary wrote an OpEd for the NY Times in which she wrote that it’s “nearly impossible to focus on substance when Trump is involved. In our three debates in 2016, he unleashed a blizzard of interruptions, insults and lies that overwhelmed the moderators and did a disservice to the voters who tuned in to learn about our visions for the country— including a record 84 million viewers for our first debate. It is a waste of time to try to refute Trump’s arguments like in a normal debate. It’s nearly impossible to identify what his arguments even are. He starts with nonsense and then digresses into blather. This has gotten only worse in the years since we debated. I was not surprised that after a recent meeting, several chief executives said that Trump, as one journalist described it, “could not keep a straight thought” and was “all over the map.” Yet expectations for him are so low that if he doesn’t literally light himself on fire on Thursday evening, some will say he was downright presidential… Trump may rant and rave in part because he wants to avoid giving straight answers about his unpopular positions, like restrictions on abortion, giving tax breaks to billionaires and selling out our planet to big oil companies in return for campaign donations. He interrupts and bullies— he even stalked me around the stage at one point— because he wants to appear dominant and throw his opponent off balance.”
As far as I know, neither corrupt Texas Republican— Ronny Jackson and Wesley Hunt— has started crying about “rigged” and “fixed” yet— but they both will. Kevin Breuninger reported that the House Ethics Committee will be opening investigations based on the Office of Congressional Ethics having found “substantial reason” to believe Jackson and Hunt used thousands of dollars of campaign funds for their own personal use. Jackson, one of Congress’ most egregious scumbags, “spent nearly $12,000 on dues, fees, meals and other expenses related to the Amarillo Club, a dining club, gym and meeting room in Amarillo, Texas, between 2020 and 2024... In both reports, the office said it found ‘substantial reason to believe’ that each congressman ‘converted campaign funds’ from their campaign committees ‘to personal use,’ or or that their committees ‘expended funds that were not attributable to bona fide campaign or political purposes.’”