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GOP Gets Good News After Midterms: Control of House Appears Likely

Photo of Jon Dougherty Jon DoughertyNovember 15, 2022
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OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.

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Not much went right for the Republican Party in last week’s midterm elections, despite the fact that historically, the party not in the White House tends to do very well.

Democrats not only held the Senate but they could add a seat if Sen. Raphael Walker hangs on to defeat Trump-backed GOP challenger Herschel Walker in next month’s runoff after both failed to receive 50 percent of the vote, as required by Georgia law. In addition, Democrats managed to win governor’s races in key states like Arizona, which is a flip from R to D, and Michigan.

However, according to projections, there is some good news for the party: It appears as though the GOP will win control of the House and, perhaps, retire Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). Even if she does stay, she will have to hand over the Speaker’s gavel in early January.

One race that helped the GOP was Lori Chavez-DeRemer, who has been projected to flip a Democratic-held House seat in Oregon. Chavez-DeRemer was the first woman and first Latina mayor of Happy Valley, Ore.

“Chavez-DeRemer was expected to defeat Democrat Jamie McLeod-Skinner, an attorney, small-business owner, and regional emergency response coordinator in Oregon’s new 5th Congressional District. The seat, which Joe Biden carried by more than 8 percentage points in the 2020 presidential election, includes a sliver of the city of Portland, many of its suburbs, the city of Bend, and large swathes of rural, central Oregon,” HuffPost reported.

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“Her projected loss to Chavez-DeRemer dashes the hopes of progressives who wanted the chance to prove their mettle in a swing seat. It also strengthens the arguments of party moderates who maintain that Schrader would have been a stronger contender, despite his close ties to the pharmaceutical industry. But the principled progressive stances ― and associations ― that were a boon for McLeod-Skinner in the primary proved a challenge in a general election,” the outlet added.

“Chavez-DeRemer and her allies have tied McLeod-Skinner to the least-popular parts of the radical left in the city of Portland. For participating in a Black Lives Matter march, serving as a city council member in a left-leaning Bay Area city, and accepting the support of the left-wing Working Families Party, which has embraced calls to defund the police, Republicans have branded McLeod-Skinner an anti-police radical,” the report continued.

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“McLeod-Skinner, who has never supported reducing police funding, enlisted the support of a former Bend police chief to vouch for her pro-law-enforcement credentials,” the outlet added.

Chavez-DeRemer slammed her Democratic opponent’s support for President Joe Biden’s left-wing agenda in an interview with the HuffPost.

“You cannot say that you’re for hardworking Americans and working families if you’re willing to support every single spending bill that Biden has brought down,” she said.

Although Latinos are “a small sector of the entire state, it’s still one of the fastest growing populations that we’re seeing,” Chavez-DeRemer said. “Giving them a voice, letting them know that we support those family values and then recognizing that they can trust us if we can look like them, understand them … and we can be relatable, I think that that’s key.”

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Regarding the economy, she noted: “The Radical Left’s policies have turned our economy into shambles and pushed inflation to record-breaking numbers. The American people, especially families, are struggling daily to purchase basic necessities and pay bills while prices continue to surge. With inflation hitting a 40-year high, it has gotten progressively harder to financially get by. This is why we must stand up against the Left’s agenda with Conservative leadership to get our economy back on track and make our country affordable again.”

On school choice in Oregon, she said: “Oregon Children were stripped of their right to a quality education because of unconstitutional mandates and harmful school closures. Now, when Oregon kids are struggling to catch up, schools are forcing divisive and politically charged issues into the classroom.

Another GOP victory that helped secure the majority is that of Rep. David Schweikert, who won reelection in Arizona.

And GOP candidate Juan Ciscomani appears to have extended his lead in Pima County, Ariz., over Democrat Kirsten Engel, according to Dave Wasserman, U.S. House editor of the nonpartisan Cook Report.

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Photo of Jon Dougherty Jon DoughertyNovember 15, 2022