For those hoping for vindication for the unprecedented damage that’s been done during the response to Covid, the midterm election results have been a bit of a disappointment. The “red wave” that many were expecting dissipated into a “red ripple.” Republicans still appear likely to take control of both the House of Representatives and the Senate, but by a narrower margin than many expected.
The results can be attributed to a number of factors, from Republican leaders’ focusing on the wrong issues to Democrats’ successful whitewashing of lockdown harms. Without question, Democrats played an outsized role in America’s catastrophic response to Covid-19. Lockdowns and mandates were far longer and stricter in left-leaning states and cities, doing incalculable harm to their own residents, economies, and societies.
Given that Democrats played such an enormous role in this policy catastrophe, it’s reasonable to expect that voters should respond by rewarding Republicans at the polls. But if Republicans want voters to take this issue as seriously as it should be taken, voters first have to see Republicans taking it seriously themselves.
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