{"id":1736498,"date":"2022-11-12T20:03:12","date_gmt":"2022-11-13T01:03:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1736498"},"modified":"2022-11-12T20:03:18","modified_gmt":"2022-11-13T01:03:18","slug":"is-it-true-that-mcconnell-tanked-senate-races-by-not-funding-candidates-like-masters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/is-it-true-that-mcconnell-tanked-senate-races-by-not-funding-candidates-like-masters\/","title":{"rendered":"Is It True That McConnell Tanked Senate Races By Not Funding Candidates Like Masters?"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">28<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fis-it-true-that-mcconnell-tanked-senate-races-by-not-funding-candidates-like-masters%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1736498&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>Supporters of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/topic\/donald-trump\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Donald Trump<\/a> claim that Senate Republican Leader <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/topic\/mitch-mcconnell\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Mitch McConnell<\/a>\u00a0(R-KY) is responsible for Senate losses because he failed to direct sufficient funding to candidates who ran with the endorsement of the former president. An analysis of campaign finance records by The Daily Wire explored whether that is true.<\/p>\n<p>The most specific criticism came from Arizona Republican Senate candidate Blake Masters, who <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ElectionWiz\/status\/1591419413701746690\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">told<\/a> Tucker Carlson that\u00a0\u201cMcConnell decided to spend millions of dollars attacking a fellow Republican in Alaska instead of helping me defeat Mark Kelly. Had he chosen to spend money in Arizona, this race would be over.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>It is true that McConnell\u2019s super PAC did not spend in the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/news\/breaking-democrat-incumbent-mark-kelly-defeats-republican-blake-masters-in-arizona-senate-race-projection\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Masters race<\/a>, and that it spent $6 million in Alaska in a race between two Republicans. However, those are the only examples like that, and the amount in question was relatively insignificant given the total spending, and\u00a0highly unlikely to have closed the substantial gap in votes in that race.<\/p>\n<p>Overall, the charge of not spending heavily on Senate races is diametrically opposite the reality of McConnell\u2019s super PAC, the Senate Leadership Fund. It was by far the largest spender of any super PAC in the 2022 cycle. It spent $230 million, vastly exceeding what its Democrat counterpart, the Senate Majority PAC, spent. Trump\u2019s super PAC, MAGA Inc., spent only 6% of what McConnell\u2019s did. At $15 million, it ranked #12 among super PACs.<\/p>\n<p>With the exception of Masters, McConnell\u2019s super PAC ran ads helping all of the Senate candidates that Trump\u2019s super PAC did. And the amounts of money it gave in each were far greater than what Trump\u2019s super PAC gave.<\/p>\n<p>In Georgia, McConnell\u2019s PAC spent more than 10 times what Trump\u2019s did pushing Herschel Walker across the finish line, at $38 million to $3.4 million. In Nevada, McConnell spent $26 million to Trump\u2019s $2 million on Adam Laxalt. In Ohio, McConnell spent $32 million to Trump\u2019s $2.3 million on J.D. Vance.<\/p>\n<p>And in Pennsylvania, McConnell spent a whopping $52 million boosting Mehmet Oz. That massive spending was viewed as necessary because Oz was viewed as a poor candidate. He had little traction even among Pennsylvania Republicans until Trump\u2019s endorsement. (At a major conference for conservative Pennsylvanians during the primary season, this reporter observed Oz\u2019s table with not a single person in line, as throngs of grassroots conservatives queued up at the tables of other candidates.) Despite the race arguably being so close because of Trump\u2019s Oz pick, Trump\u2019s super PAC spent only $3.5 million supporting Oz\u2019s campaign.<\/p>\n<p>McConnell\u2019s PAC also spent money in competitive Senate races that Trump\u2019s did not, including in North Carolina, New Hampshire, and Wisconsin.<\/p>\n<p>SuperPAC spending in Senate general electionGreen=McConnell, Orange=Trump, Red=Other Republican. Blue=DemocratAK (R)<\/p>\n<p>$6M<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0.<\/p>\n<p>$3MAK (D)<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0.<\/p>\n<p>$9MAZ (R)<\/p>\n<p>4M<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0.<\/p>\n<p>$53MAZ (D)<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0.<\/p>\n<p>$57MGA (R)<\/p>\n<p>$38M<\/p>\n<p>3M<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0.<\/p>\n<p>$72MGA (D)<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0.<\/p>\n<p>$72MNC (R)<\/p>\n<p>$38M<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0.<\/p>\n<p>$65MNC (D)<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0.<\/p>\n<p>$22MNH (R)<\/p>\n<p>$16M<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0.<\/p>\n<p>$23MNH (D)<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0.<\/p>\n<p>$22MNV (R)<\/p>\n<p>$26M<\/p>\n<p>2M<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0.<\/p>\n<p>$57MNV (D)<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0.<\/p>\n<p>$67MOH (R)<\/p>\n<p>$32M<\/p>\n<p>2M<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0.<\/p>\n<p>$39MOH (D)<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0.<\/p>\n<p>$16MPA (R)<\/p>\n<p>$52M<\/p>\n<p>3M<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0.<\/p>\n<p>$105MPA (D)<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0.<\/p>\n<p>$106MWI (R)<\/p>\n<p>$26M<\/p>\n<p>.<\/p>\n<p>$66MWI (D)<\/p>\n<p>.<\/p>\n<p>$43M<\/p>\n<p>Earning some conservatives\u2019 ire was the fact that the Senate Leadership Fund spent $6 million opposing Republican Kelly Tshibaka in an effort to help moderate Republican incumbent Lisa Murkowski win. Because of Alaska\u2019s ranked-choice voting system, the two Republicans are facing each other. Trump endorsed Tshibaka, but his super PAC did not pay for any ads in the race. Some Trump supporters believe that the $6 million would have been decisive if it was allocated to Arizona instead.<\/p>\n<p>However, Masters already had a head start in outside spending thanks to billionaire Peter Thiel. Masters was supported by $53 million in super PAC spending, essentially tied with his opponent Mark Kelly, at $57 million. With spending so high already, it\u2019s not clear that an extra $6 million would have made a difference. With 90% of votes counted as of Saturday night, <a href=\"https:\/\/results.decisiondeskhq.com\/national\/2022-senate\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">DecisionDeskHQ<\/a> has called the Arizona race for Kelly with a significant gap: 52% to 46%.<\/p>\n<p>There was also no reason to assume that the $6 million would have been reallocated to Arizona instead of, say, Nevada, where Democrats were outspending Republican super PACs by a greater margin, and the race is <a href=\"https:\/\/results.decisiondeskhq.com\/national\/2022-senate\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">far closer<\/a>. Additionally, it was Thiel who reportedly <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/teddyschleifer\/status\/1591272582250385410\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">backed away<\/a> from an additional $10 million in spending he was contemplating.<\/p>\n<p>Trump\u2019s own financial contribution to the Arizona Senate battle was $3.7 million, making up only 6% of Masters\u2019 outside cash. That\u2019s despite Trump\u2019s main PAC, Save America, taking in $107 million in the 2022 cycle, and having nearly <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fec.gov\/data\/committee\/C00762591\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">$70 million<\/a> in the bank as of October 19. If he had spent most of that money supporting his chosen Arizona candidate, Masters could have had double the super PAC spending of his opponent.<\/p>\n<p>Instead, Trump set up a web page that purported to raise money for both himself and Masters. But hidden from the user \u2014 unless they clicked a toggle in the fine print \u2014 was the fact that for every $100 donated, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/news\/democrats-spent-more-backing-trump-esque-candidates-in-primaries-than-trump-has\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">$99 went to Trump and $1 went to Masters.<\/a> That\u2019s despite Masters imminently facing a critical race and Trump not being<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Supporters of Donald Trump claim that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is responsible for Senate losses because he failed to direct sufficient funding to candidates who ran with the help of backing from the former president. An analysis of campaign finance records by The Daily Wire explored whether that is true.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":128,"featured_media":1706063,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[541],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1736498","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-daily-wire"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1736498","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/128"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1736498"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1736498\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1706063"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1736498"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1736498"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1736498"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}