O’Donnell’s Defeat in Nevada
It was a big night for Democrats in the US, as a “blue wave” saw the party retake control of Congress in what CNN called “a stunning blow to Trump.” Among the night’s big losers is former Halo composer Marty O’Donnell, whose run for Congress ended in a spectacular, crushing defeat—and then a dunk from his congressional opponent that can only be described as brutal.
O’Donnell began his political career in 2024, saying he “never wanted to be a politician” but felt compelled to do so by what he described as the deterioration of the US: “Big tech, big pharma, big media, big whatever—all trying to control big government in Washington DC.”
That effort didn’t work out so well—he placed fourth in the 2024 Republican primary for Nevada’s third congressional district—but he tried again in 2026, this time with the support of US president Donald Trump, which O’Donnell enthusiastically welcomed despite previously calling Trump an “idiot.” Well, winds and tides change.
Anyway, O’Donnell won the 2026 Republican primary, and then got in the ring with Susie Lee, the Democrat incumbent who’s held the seat since 2019. It did not go well for him.
Hey, that happens sometimes—you think you got it, and then it turns out you don’t actually got it at all.
But O’Donnell’s Trump-toned campaign, complete with dire warnings about open borders, Marxism and the woke left, accusations of corruption leveled against Lee, embrace of the far-right commentariat, and occasional asides to remind everyone that he’s absolutely not mad about being fired by Bungie, did not exactly endear him to his political opponents, or very many other people, really.
So after dismantling O’Donnell, the re-elected Lee—who seemed to largely ignore O’Donnell’s rhetoric during the campaign—sent him off into the sunset with this:
I’m just a bystander on the scene—I’m not even American, much less a Democrat cheerleader. But holy cow. You can see that crater from orbit.
O’Donnell did not take Lee’s farewell particularly well, which led to even more smoke in the comments.
I think this is one of those times were you have to just take it on the chin and move along. We’ll see how that goes.
