Mitch McConnell is facing even more bad news for Republicans

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Mitch McConnell is known in Washington and Kentucky for never saying more than he feels is necessary to get his message across. And yesterday, he essentially waved a white flag, all but admitting that Republicans might not be able to flip the Senate this cycle.

“I think there’s probably a greater likelihood the House flips than the Senate. Senate races are just different — they’re statewide, candidate quality has a lot to do with the outcome,” NBC News’s Frank Thorp quoted him saying.

This a bit of a shift for the Minority Leader. A few weeks back, McConnell told Fox News that “we’re likely to have a very, very close Senate still, with either us up slightly or the Democrats up slightly” – but now, he’s saying not to expect a resounding victory.

He could be trying to lower expectations so if Republicans do take the Senate, he can be seen as a hero. But McConnell has feared the right flank of his party ever since the 2010 Kentucky Senate primary, when Rand Paul beat his preferred candidate Trey Grayson. That year, and again in 2012, it was crackpot candidates, not failed establishment nominees, who really blew Republicans’ chances of winning back the majority.

There is evidence that McConnell is right about this year’s crop. Donald Trump’s endorsements of Blake Masters in Arizona, JD Vance in Ohio, Herschel Walker in Georgia and Dr Mehmet Oz in Pennsylvania may have clinched them their nominations, but they also saddled Republicans with candidates who might not be able to make it across the finish line. And now, it looks like McConnell may have to bail some candidates out.

Cleveland.com reported yesterday that the McConnell-affiliated Senate Leadership Fund is reserving a whopping $28 million worth of television and radio ads in Ohio to boost Vance, whom a poll from Emerson College showed is falling behind Representative Tim Ryan, putting him on 42 per cent to Ryan’s 45.

Ohio’s status as a perpetual swing state faded a while ago, and it has now become a solid Republican stronghold. For context, in 2016, Senator Rob Portman, who is retiring this year, won re-election by more than 20 points and significantly outran Trump. The fact that McConnell-world needs to spend money in it will be irritating, but it cannot allow itself to be seen as giving up such a secure red state. Whether the money will be enough to salvage Vance’s chances is a whole other question.

But Ohio isn’t the only state where McConnell is having to make tough choices. In Arizona, incumbent Senator Mark Kelly is beating Masters by eight points, according to a Fox News poll (Fox’s polls are usually considered accurate, and Kelly is well clear of the 3 per cent margin of error). Fox also showed that Wisconsin Lieutenant Governor Mandela Barnes, who cleared the Democratic field before the state’s primary, is beating Republican Senator Ron Johnson by four points – the second poll this week that showed Johnson trailing Barnes.

Some media reports have said that Barnes might be too far left for swingy Wisconsin. It is entirely possible that McConnell’s cavalry might come in, bring up Barnes’s old record and save Johnson, who after all outperformed Trump in 2016 – even as Trump became the first Republican to win the state since Ronald Reagan in 1984. But as of right now, he is just the latest code-red emergency for Senate Republicans in a year where precedent says they should be almost guaranteed to advance.