FULL RETREAT

MAGA Senate Candidate Raises White Flag in Must-Win Seat

Republicans are entering crisis mode as states won by the president are now comfortably breaking for Democrats.

A Trump-endorsed Senate candidate has pulled television ads as polling shows his must-win race is slipping away for the GOP.

Republican Michael Whatley, 58, trails Democrat Roy Cooper, 69, by an average of nine points in North Carolina, says the RealClearPolitics polling average—apparently enough for Whatley’s campaign to pause its TV ads, a campaign source told the Raleigh News & Observer.

The move, the source said, indicated the campaign was readjusting to reach its target audience, though many have interpreted the move as Republicans waving the white flag in a state Trump won in all three of his presidential elections.

“We are confident we have the resources to target our late-breaking supporters and win on Election Day,” the source insisted to the paper.

The revelation comes five days after the Senate Leadership Fund, a major Republican PAC, pulled its spending on Whatley, too. The group, which had already spent at least $30 million on Whatley and had reserved another $15 million, would instead be shifting money to more competitive races, WRAL reported.

One such race is in Kansas, where Republican Sen. Roger Marshall is running for re-election against Adam Hamilton, a Democratic pastor. While Marshall was once the heavy favorite, nonpartisan election forecaster Cook Political Report said last week it was shifting its rating from “Likely Republican” to merely “Lean Republican.”

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Semafor reports that Old North Action, which canceled a $6.5 million investment, is also hanging Whatley out to dry. Then, when Americans for Prosperity Action bought $22 million in ads last week, it left North Carolina out of its spending.

In response to these withdrawals, the Democratic-linked super PAC WinSenate took down its own ads in North Carolina, The Hill reported Monday.

Cooper has an 83 percent chance of winning, according to Decisino Desk HQ, which gives Democrats a 57 percent chance of retaking the Senate. Besides Kansas and North Carolina, where Republican incumbent Thom Tillis is retiring, other potential Democratic pick-ups include races in Maine, Ohio, Alaska, Texas, and Iowa.

Whatley’s campaign spokesperson, DJ Griffin, maintains that the race is still competitive.

“Roy Cooper recently said about federal elections in North Carolina, ‘Democrats are often ahead until they are not,’” Griffin said in a statement to WRAL. “Undecided voters who break late decide the election in North Carolina and the majority of those late-breakers typically go Republican. We feel confident we have the resources to highlight career politician Roy Cooper’s 40 Years of failures and win in November.”

Cooper campaign manager Jeff Allen admitted there’s work to be done.

“A Democrat has not won statewide federal office here in nearly two decades, and North Carolina is a 50-50 state,” Allen told WRAL. “We’re building a campaign to earn every vote and make sure North Carolinians know that Roy Cooper will fight for them, while Michael Whatley will continue to enrich himself at their expense.”

The Daily Beast has reached out to both campaigns for comment.

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