Ben Shapiro Says 2026 Midterms Were “A Wipeout for Republicans”: “The President Was Kind of on the Ballot”

Ben Shapiro reacted to the early results of the 2026 midterms during an appearance on the All-In podcast Tuesday night, noting that he thinks early tallies indicated that “the president was kind of on the ballot.”

“This not an evening to remember,” he said on the podcast, which streamed from 8 p.m. ET to 10 p.m. ET on Tuesday night, before some of the major race results were called. “I think that, honestly, the president said going in that the election was going to be a referendum on him, act like he’s on the ballot, and I think that, you know, the president was kind of on the ballot.”

Shapiro argued “if this were just the case of a few outstandingly bad Republican candidates losing, like Paxton in Texas, for example, or if it were just a matter of an outstanding Democrat candidate winning somewhere, like Josh Turek in Iowa, … but the fact that South Carolina is going, you basically have an empty suit in South Carolina losing.”

Texas had history-making results, as the state elected James Talarico as defeated Ken Paxton, becoming the first Democrat elected as a senator in 38 years; Gina Hinojosa also beat Greg Abbott to become the first Democratic governor of Texas in 36 years.

As for South Carolina, Annie Andrews became the state’s first Democrat elected to the Senate in over 20 years. She also became the first woman from South Carolina to be elected to the Senate.

“Or the fact that Florida stayed red, but very, very, very closely. I mean, that’s my home state so I know that state very well, Angie Nixon is a full-scale nutcase, and Angie Nixon is going to lose that senatorial race by about two points,” he added. (Democrat Nixon was defeated by Republican Ashley Moody in Florida’s U.S. Senator race.)

“It’s a wipeout for Republicans,” Shapiro asserted. “There’s no way to sugarcoat that. And again, if you’re looking at it across the map, that bodes pretty ill for 2028.”