WASHINGTON (The Thursday Times) — US Vice President JD Vance has said Republicans lost the midterm elections because of the war with Iran, in an unusually blunt statement after Democrats took both chambers of Congress.
“The reason we lost is the war. The president himself said so last night,” Vance wrote on X on Wednesday. “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. Argue it was a worthwhile cost to pay. Agree or disagree, that’s at least honest. But everyone knows why we lost.”
He said the problem was not Republican turnout. “Our voters did show up,” he wrote, citing Florida, where he said the electorate was nine points more Republican than Democratic. “The main problem is that many people who voted for Trump/Vance in 2024 voted for Democrats in 2026.”
What voters told a pollster
Vance said a pollster he described as one of the smartest people he knows in politics had predicted a 13-point loss on the generic ballot, the national measure of congressional support. Asked what would bring them back, Trump voters who had left gave four main answers, he said: end the war, focus on the cost of living and inflation, put America First, and change the relationship with Israel. He did not name the pollster or publish the figures.
He also defended Rachel Campos Duffy, the conservative commentator, who he said had been attacked on Monday for calling for a diplomatic resolution to the conflict. “It turns out her political advice was sound,” he wrote. And he warned against what he said would be efforts to present amnesty for illegal immigrants as the answer. “Anyone pushing amnesty is lying to you,” he said.
Going further than Trump
Vance’s account is more direct than the president’s. President Donald Trump said in an interview after the results that “a part of it was Iran”, but also: “I don’t think it’s the war. I think it’s a gasoline price.” He said he remained convinced that his decision on Iran was correct, and that the war would end “when I say it ends”.
The statement comes at a delicate moment in that war, in which Pakistan has been a central go-between. Vance said on Monday that there had been “some progress” with Iran, and that Trump “retains kinetic options”. US forces struck Iran’s Qeshm Island hours later. Qatari mediators are still working on a proposal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, and Iran’s chief negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, has read the vote as Americans saying “no to war”.
Vance did not call for any specific change in policy on Iran, and he said he remained hopeful about the country. Democrats take control of Congress in January.
