Politicians who always narrowly lose

[I’m not Stu]

What politicians always narrowly lose?

[JMT]

I’m not sure if someone is considered a politician if they “always” lose (seems like this would be a perennial candidate). But, some politicians have had quite a few narrow loses (in addition to some wins). Here’s a couple examples:

-Karen Handel: narrowly lost a 2002 Fulton County Commission race, and narrowly lost primaries for Governor in 2010 and U.S. Senate in 2014. She also narrowly lost re-election to the U.S. House in 2018 (and lost a rematch by a wider margin in 2020).
-Dino Rossi: narrowly lost 1992 State Senate race and 2004 Governor’s race. Somewhat narrowly lost 2008 Governor’s race, 2010 U.S. Senate race, and 2018 U.S. House race.

[I’m not Stu]

Dino Rossi

[Xing]

Paul Davis? If we’re counting primaries, then Jessica Cisneros.

[RI]

Charles Djou lost four close races (1998, 2012, 2014, 2016). If twice counts, then David Kim in CA-34 comes to mind (2020, 2022).

[I’m not Stu]

Paul Davis? If we’re counting primaries, then Jessica Cisneros.

But won't Henry Cuellar lose this time?

[TML]

Paul Davis? If we’re counting primaries, then Jessica Cisneros.

But won't Henry Cuellar lose this time?

Cuellar's last victory was due to strong institutional support from establishment Democrats. If his institutional support remains strong enough, he can definitely win again.

[GM Team Member and Senator WB]

Paul Davis? If we’re counting primaries, then Jessica Cisneros.

But won't Henry Cuellar lose this time?

Cuellar's last victory was due to strong institutional support from establishment Democrats. If his institutional support remains strong enough, he can definitely win again.

Post-Dobbs, institutional support might be reluctant. The runoff was after the leaked decision, but it was before the case was formally decided. Cuellar only won by 200 votes with all that institutional support, too.

[Shaula🏳️‍⚧️]

Paul Davis? If we’re counting primaries, then Jessica Cisneros.

But won't Henry Cuellar lose this time?

Cuellar's last victory was due to strong institutional support from establishment Democrats. If his institutional support remains strong enough, he can definitely win again.

Post-Dobbs, institutional support might be reluctant. The runoff was after the leaked decision, but it was before the case was formally decided. Cuellar only won by 200 votes with all that institutional support, too.

Tbf Cuellar votes more with the pro-choice side than the pro-life side by now anyway lol

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

Ted Strickland lost 2010/16 during DeWine era
Kari Lake she really thinks she can beat Gallego a seasoned Vet
BETO he has a stutters problem

[I’m not Stu]

Does the current TX-28 include more or less of San Antonio? If more, then I know Cuellar finally loses. Christy Smith always lost by a fairly narrow margin?

[Vosem]

Dino Rossi is the paradigmatic example here of someone who always performs really well given the circumstances but never actually wins, ever.

In terms of someone who kept being associated with losing campaigns but whose career kept not dying, John Tory before he was elected Mayor of Toronto in 2014 had an amazingly bad track record, being closely involved with the 1985 Ontario PC campaign (their first defeat in decades), the 1993 national PC campaign (when the party collapsed never to recover), and then personally running for Mayor of Toronto in 2003 (and losing embarrassingly) and then also personally losing the 2007 Ontario general election as PC leader (embarrassingly) and a by-election in a safe seat in 2009 (embarrassingly).

Then somehow he came back from that to be a pretty successful Toronto Mayor for a decade before randomly resigning because of a sex scandal.