President Donald Trump did all he could to help Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin hold his seat, but at the end of the day, the incumbent Republican's numbers were not there, Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel said Thursday.
"We won five out of six statewide," McDaniel said on Fox News' "America's Newsroom."
"We saw Matt Bevin had high negatives. In our internal data months ago, he was down 15, 16, 17 points. We knew the president had to get in. He is a fighter and will help every single Republican."
Bevin on Wednesday asked for the state's election results to be recanvassed after he was shown to be more than 5,000 votes behind Democrat Andy Beshear, the state's attorney general. Beshear, however, said he's confident in the outcome and that any review will show he won.
McDaniel said the loss did not point to an issue about Trump.
"When you win five of six statewide races and the governor is the lowest performer, it is an issue about the candidate," she said. "The president did everything he could."
She wouldn't comment about whether Benin should concede the election.
"He is doing what he needs to do," she said. "I won't interfere with that. He knows his state better and he is recanvassing and we'll see what happens."
Tuesday's election showed the GOP losing voters for the third election in a row, show co-host Bill Hemmer said, but McDaniel said one must remember Trump wasn't on the ballot in those races.
"He is going into those states and bringing a lot of our candidates across the finish line," said McDaniel. "He does well in rural areas. In the suburbs, they're rejecting the socialist agenda of the Democrat Party. When you have an Elizabeth Warren on the ballot or Joe Biden talking about giving free healthcare to illegal immigrants and having a government takeover of healthcare, that's where we are getting the voters back."
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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