Pennsylvania Republicans have regrets. A lot of them. https://www.politico.com/newsletter...publicans-have-regrets-a-lot-of-them-00066599 The midterm election was a letdown for the GOP across the map. But no one had it quite so bad as Pennsylvania’s Republicans. Their candidates not only underperformed expectations — they got swept under a blue wave. Democrats in Pennsylvania won the races for governor and Senate, and they may take control of the state House for the first time since 2010, something many in the party didn’t even think was possible this year. The shellacking has been humbling — and infuriating — for the GOP. That’s because many in the state’s Republican establishment saw this coming: Afraid far-right state Sen. Doug Mastriano would lead the GOP ticket to down-ballot slaughter, they made a last-ditch effort in the primary to stop him from winning the gubernatorial nomination. And they largely wanted Dave McCormick, a former hedge fund CEO who had deeper ties to the state than Mehmet Oz, to win the Senate nod. That has some pointing fingers at former President Donald Trump, whose endorsement of Oz proved pivotal in a primary he won by fewer than 1,000 votes. Many establishment types also fault Trump for not marshaling the party behind an alternative to Mastriano — and, instead, endorsing him days before the primary when Mastriano was already on track to win. “President Trump weighing in did not help either race,” said Rob Gleason, the former chair of Pennsylvania’s Republican Party who worked to elect Trump in the state in 2016. “Many of the regulars were for McCormick because they felt that McCormick would be the stronger candidate. And although he was gone for a while, he did have strong roots in Pennsylvania. Even today as I sit here and look at the results, he would have been a winner.” Trump didn’t merely endorse McCormick’s opponent. He also unleashed on McCormick at a rally for Oz, bashing him as a “liberal Wall Street Republican” who was insufficiently MAGA. That rally might have won Oz the nomination: According to a person familiar with McCormick’s internal polling, it showed that he was still holding onto a lead after Trump’s endorsement. It wasn’t until Trump’s smackdown that he really took a hit, the source said — with Oz gaining ground and another candidate, MAGA firebrand Kathy Barnette, rising. Andy Reilly, a Republican National Committeeman in Pennsylvania, said many Trump-endorsed candidates across the country this year did not “appeal to the general election audience.” Reilly called Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is seen as Trump’s top rival for the 2024 presidential nomination, “the model we can look towards.” DeSantis won reelection this week by 19 percentage points, even flipping Democratic Miami-Dade Countyin the process. “He’s a conservative, he’s tough, but he’s also someone with compassion.” We’re old enough to remember when some Republicans distanced themselves from Trump in the wake of the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol — or after the Access Hollywood scandal in 2016 — only to come back into his good graces later on. But with a Trump 2024 presidential announcement potentially days away, the fact that Republicans in a major battleground state like Pennsylvania are critiquing Trump — and praising DeSantis — carries a little more weight than usual. At the very least, it’s not great timing for Trump. “We have factions in our party because we have two parties. Whoever keeps their factions together wins,” said Reilly. “While President Trump has many good political qualities, keeping factions together is not among them.”