Vance blames the Iran war for the Republican midterm defeat
Seven Lights
Vice President JD Vance said the war with Iran was “the real reason” Republicans lost the midterm elections, the plainest public break yet with President Trump’s signature foreign-policy decision as the 2028 cycle begins.
“The real reason we lost is obvious to almost everyone… The reason we lost is the war. The president himself said so last night,” Mr Vance wrote in a lengthy post on X on Wednesday morning. “If you’d like to argue it was worth it, that losing the Senate for the next 6 years was worth it, then do so. Agree or disagree, that’s at least honest.” Everyone knows why the party lost, he added, “and any honest conversation about where we go from here must start there”.
Mr Trump acknowledged the war’s weight on Tuesday in a phone interview with The Wall Street Journal. “Iran was a piece of it,” he said, though he hedged and did not say he regretted it. At a White House event on Wednesday afternoon, Mr Trump said of the war that it had “drove the gasoline up a little bit, short term”. “But at the same time, if I had to do it again, I’d have to do it again because long term, it’s the only answer,” he said. “You have no choice. You have to do it. You can’t let Iran have a nuclear weapon.”
The war, which Mr Trump launched in February alongside Israel, remains unresolved. Mr Vance had reportedly been sceptical of it and once led the administration’s deal-making efforts with Tehran. In his post, he set out what the party must do to win back voters who backed Mr Trump in 2024 and voted Democratic on Tuesday. They were: end the Iran war, focus on inflation, “put America First,” and “change our relationship to Israel.”
The “Democrat blowout” came despite White House optimism about turnout, Mr Vance wrote, and “many people who voted for Trump/Vance in 2024 voted for Democrats in 2026.” To voters angry at the results, he added: “you should be. Let’s take that anger and get back to the work of saving our country.”
Exit polls put cost of living and government corruption as the electorate’s two top issues. Gas prices and grocery costs have risen amid the war and the president’s tariff policies. Mr Trump’s son Donald Trump Jr was quick to endorse Mr Vance’s message. The White House and the vice president’s office did not immediately respond to requests for comment.