A conservative commentator has offered an unusual diagnosis for Republicans’ bruising midterm losses, saying that the party needs better-looking candidates. Peachy Keenan argued after the election that male Republican candidates should be more carefully vetted for physical attractiveness, pointing to facial symmetry, clear skin, build, and hair, and contending that most losing GOP candidates failed what she called the basic “looksmaxxer test.” Newsweek reached out to the Republican National Committee for comment. The argument may sound deliberately provocative, but the underlying premise is not entirely frivolous.
A substantial body of political science research has found links between candidates’ appearances, perceptions of traits such as competence and electoral performance. Democrats emerged from the midterm elections with control of both chambers of Congress after victories in states and districts Republicans once considered secure, prompting an unusual post-election theory about one possible advantage some winners enjoyed: They looked the part. Democrats have taken 54 Senate seats and are projected to take between 251 and 268 House seats, turning what might otherwise be dismissed as an internet joke about attractive candidates into a question arriving amid a genuine political realignment.
The consequences for Donald Trump are considerably more serious than aesthetics. Democrats will take control of the House and Senate in January, giving the party greater power to block legislation, scrutinize the administration and investigate the president during the second half of his term. Republicans themselves have already been talking about looks, not least Trump, however.
In the closing weeks of the campaign, the president repeatedly promoted Republican candidates partly by assessing their appearance, calling House candidate Ed Gallrein a “beautiful guy” who looked like “Central Casting,” describing Jon Husted as good-looking and scrutinizing his physique, and taking the opposite approach with Texas Republican Ken Paxton, saying he did not like the way the candidate looked. The joke after Election Day, then, comes with an uncomfortable question for a Republican Party picking through a sweeping defeat: Does MAGA have a hotness problem? Democrats’ success went far beyond a handful of photogenic candidates.
They flipped Senate seats in Texas, Iowa, Kansas, Ohio, Maine, North Carolina and South Carolina while retaining competitive seats including Georgia and Michigan. James Talarico defeated Ken Paxton in Texas, Sherrod Brown beat Jon Husted in Ohio, and Abdul El-Sayed won Michigan. Jon Ossoff comfortably retained his Georgia Senate seat against Republican Mike Collins.
More obvious explanations explain the result than anyone's jawline. CBS described Tuesday as a broad rebuke of congressional Republicans and Trump's agenda, while other election coverage pointed to the cost of living and the war with Iran among voters' major concerns. Yet the winners arrived after months of cultural chatter about a younger class of Democratic politicians whose physical presentation has become part of their political identity.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
