The hosts of “Fox & Friends” didn’t sugarcoat Tuesday night’s results for Republicans. They urged the party to take an honest look at what went wrong after Democrats seized control of Congress.
In a subdued opening Wednesday morning, co-hosts Lawrence Jones, Ainsley Earhardt and Brian Kilmeade said voters had sent an unmistakable message.
“The only good news for Republicans is that they can live to fight another day,” Jones said.
Jones said voters had been clear about how they feel and that the party can’t simply argue them out of it. He said he supports what the president did with the war in Iran, but people are furious about it. Republicans can point to conditions under former President Joe Biden all day long, he said, but voters are angry about gas prices and the economy right now and want the politics to shift.
Earhardt focused on the economy as the main driver of the GOP’s losses. “The economy is good, but people aren’t feeling it,” she said. She described hearing from Americans who still earn good money but say they are spending far more to feed their families and can’t keep it up.
Jones also pointed to the size of the Democratic margins. With leads of nine points, and at times 20 points, over the course of the night, he said it wasn’t just Democrats turning out. Lifelong Republicans were sending a message to their own party. He said he understood the moral case for the war and for competing on data centers, but the party has to listen when its own voters raise concerns.
Jones, a native Texan, closed the segment by focusing on the Lone Star State, where Democrats won both the Senate and governor’s races. He said the results there sent a devastating signal to Republicans nationally.
The hosts said Republicans have a lot to look at in the mirror and fix.
The results were sweeping. As of Wednesday, Democrats had flipped seven Senate seats and more than two dozen House seats. In Texas, Democrat James Talarico defeated Attorney General Ken Paxton for the Senate, and Democrat Gina Hinojosa won the governor’s race. Democrats also won Senate races in Kansas and Iowa and pulled off an upset in South Carolina.
Republicans in Ohio, Maine and North Carolina also suffered painful defeats. In Maine, Republican Sen. Susan Collins, first elected in 1996, lost her seat.
The commentary reflected a growing number of Republicans looking inward Wednesday. Vice President JD Vance blamed the war with Iran. Nebraska Rep. Don Bacon said Americans don’t like chaos, tariffs and corruption. He urged the party to return to its roots of free markets, low taxes and peace through strength.
The defeat is a major setback for President Trump’s agenda heading into the final two years of his term.
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