ALGOP Chairman: Election loss is 'a wake-up call for the Republican Party nationally'

Alabama Republican Party Chairman John Wahl reacted to his party losing a seat in the Alabama House of Representatives on Tuesday in a special election he says Democrats “got lucky” in winning. Democratic candidate Marilyn Lands defeated Republican Teddy Powell in House District 10 with 62% of the vote.

Lands campaigned on a staunchly pro-abortion and anti-gun positions message, while Powell focused more on education and infrastructure. President Joe Biden’s campaign praised the victory.

Chairman Wahl said Republican Party candidates and consultants across the country need a bold message if they want to win in November during a Wednesday interview on WVNN’s “The Yaffee Program.”

“I will say it is a wake-up call for the Republican Party nationally,” Wahl said. “And I think it should be a wake-up call to all the consultants and all the candidates out there who take a middle of a road approach. I do not believe that as a message. I did not believe that is the vehicle for the Republican Party to win. And if we continue to take that, I think we could be in trouble. But if we learn our lessons, and we come back, figure out what those messages are.”

Wahl thinks that his party will be more successful if they don’t shy away from the certain issues that the voters currently care about in Alabama.

“The Republican Party needs to be standing for things like in my opinion, parental rights, protecting children from old policies, getting involved in a culture war,” he argued. “That’s the Republicans abortion issue. But if we don’t grab it if we don’t seize our opportunity then we could be in trouble. It’s our it’s how I look at it. It is our decision whether we’re in trouble or not in November.”

The GOP Chair admitted that the special election outcome is good news for Democrats, he also thinks their reaction to it has been a little over the top.

“Well, look, I always I would always rather an opponent who’s overconfident,” he said. “So if this gives them some kind of competitive overconfidence, so be it. I kind of saw this reaction coming from them. They’ve been building this race up for weeks before. They knew that this was a swing district. They knew they had a good shot at winning it… what they’re not being honest about is this is not Alabama as a whole. If this was a statewide race, they would have been demolished. There are purple districts everywhere. So for them to say, ‘Oh, Ruby Red, Alabama went Democrat.’ No, no. One small swing district that was a 50-50 district went Democrat. That’s a big difference. And I think it’s disingenuous from that to not recognize the real scenario.”

Wahl said he still believes Republicans will do well in November because the Democratic Party has become too radical and that will ultimately turn voters against them.

“[I]f you look at the border, complete disaster if you look at foreign policy, complete disaster, you look the economy complete disaster across the board, every other area of America,” he explained. “You don’t have to tell them, they know that Democrats have lost their minds. And I’m gonna give you one of those examples that I think should have been using this house this weekend race. Democrats cannot even tell the difference between men and women. There’s a problem with that. And you know what the American people can tell the difference between a man and a woman. And they know that Democrats Democrats have lost their minds when they say they can’t. And I think issues like those we have got to talk about them because it highlights the stupidity the sheer stupidity of the National Democratic Party right now.”

Yaffee is a contributing writer to Yellowhammer News and hosts “The Yaffee Program” Weekdays 9-11am on WVNN. You can follow him on Twitter @Yaffee