In a new column, the Conservative periodical, The National Review, bashed the Republican party for continually putting up terrible candidates in winnable races.
There are few news sources more conservative than the National Review, which was founded by William F. Buckley Jr. back in 1955. The magazine has been willing to speak out against Donald Trump who is truly, the furthest thing from a conservative.
In the latest piece, the editors wrote:
It is appropriate to ask why Mark Robinson cruised to the GOP nomination in 2024 when the contents of his opposition file were already an open secret in state politics for years, so much so that he was making terrified excuses for them in private to donors well over a year ago. What was known about him by all at that point — to name but one thing, his long history of making antisemitic comments and curiously ambivalent statements about Nazi Germany — should have been more than disqualifying,
The editors also noted that Donald Trump has so conditioned Republican voters that they probably would have nominated Robinson anyway:
"But there is more to it than just that, for Robinson was likely to win his primary regardless of Trump’s intervention: He is a bomb-thrower skilled at inflaming his right-wing audiences and playing to January 6 truthers and other cranks. The Republican Party, beginning with its voters, needs to recognize that choosing candidates based on their offensiveness and fringy vibes is a formula for futility. Chalk up the North Carolina governorship as another office lost for the GOP by forfeit."