House Majority Whip Steve Scalise warned Friday that Democratic nominees in a small slice of House districts could win if Republican voters stay home, describing the party’s left flank as “crazy” and claiming some candidates hold positions far outside the mainstream.
Appearing on Fox News’ “Hannity,” the Louisiana Republican told host Sean Hannity that only about 25 to 30 congressional races are genuinely competitive this cycle — and that the contrast between the parties in those districts is stark.
“Voters are starting to recognize this sharp, sharp contrast between common sense and crazy,” Scalise said, according to Breitbart News, which first flagged the clip.
Scalise Points to Primary Wins by Left-Leaning Candidates
Scalise argued that Democratic primary voters have been elevating candidates well to the left of the party’s traditional liberal wing, pointing to positions on immigration, healthcare and gun policy.
“The Democrats have nominated not just liberals, they’re beating liberals in primaries with socialists, people that want open borders,” he said. “They want to get rid of your healthcare, literally banning private insurance.”
The majority whip said he had spent the past week campaigning across eight competitive districts, including a swing through New York and a stop in northeastern Pennsylvania.
He specifically cited a race in the Scranton and Wilkes-Barre area, where he appeared alongside Republican candidate Barb Bresnahan. Scalise claimed her opponent supports not only defunding police departments but disarming officers altogether.
“His opponent not only wants to defund the police, his opponent wants to disarm police,” Scalise said. “Actually, get rid of their guns. Not the criminals’ guns, Sean, but the cops wouldn’t have guns, but the criminals would. These people are crazy.”
The characterization of Bresnahan’s opponent was not independently verified in the source account, and the opponent was not named in the segment as described.
A Closing Argument Built on Turnout
Scalise’s broader message was less about individual races than about turnout math. He framed the midterms as a binary choice that hinges on whether Republican-leaning voters actually cast ballots.
“If people stay home, and that’s why I think the message has got to be — everybody’s got to vote, like your vote will make the determination on whether we have a socialist country or not, because if people show up, we will win,” he said. “If people stay home, these crazy socialists can win.”
The appearance reflects a familiar late-cycle strategy: rather than promising a wave, party leaders warn their own base that complacency could hand victory to the other side. By naming a specific number of battleground seats — roughly 25 to 30 — Scalise also narrowed the battlefield in a way that could help donors and activists focus their resources.
Hannity opened the exchange by offering his own read of the map, asking Scalise whether about 25 to 30 seats were the ones drawing real attention. Scalise agreed with that estimate before launching into his critique.
A Familiar Line of Attack, With a Specific Target
Scalise’s remarks echo a broader Republican effort to tie Democratic candidates to the party’s most progressive voices on issues such as border enforcement, Medicare for All-style healthcare proposals and police funding. Whether those attacks land depends heavily on how individual Democratic nominees in swing districts have positioned themselves — many of whom have distanced themselves from more sweeping proposals.
Democrats, for their part, have generally rejected the characterization that their nominees want open borders or to eliminate private insurance, and many candidates in competitive districts have campaigned on more moderate platforms.
Still, Scalise’s language — “common sense and crazy” — signals that Republican messaging in the closing stretch will lean on sharp contrasts rather than granular policy detail, particularly in the small set of districts that will determine control of the House.
With early voting underway in many states and the election calendar tightening, both parties are concentrating on turnout among their most reliable supporters. Scalise’s warning was aimed squarely at his own coalition: that the outcome, in his telling, rests on whether they show up.
Source: www.breitbart.com — https://www.breitbart.com/clips/2026/10/03/scalise-these-people-are-crazy/