Lamb on Trump’s jabs: ‘There was a lot of foolishness in this election’

Democrat Conor Lamb told CNN early Wednesday that the special congressional election in Pennsylvania was rife with “foolishness” after being shown a clip of President Trump calling him “Lamb the sham” during a campaign rally.

Lamb, who declared victory Tuesday night against GOP state Rep. Rick Saccone even though state election officials say the race is too close to call, told CNN’s “New Day” that voters are “tired” of the political games Trump engaged in during a rally for Saccone over the weekend.

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“Just apart from that, there was a lot of foolishness in this election and a lot of really cartoonish campaigning, and I think by the time of the president’s visit last weekend, people were kind of tired of that entire approach,” Lamb said.

“I had people coming up to me —especially elderly people — coming up to me every day and saying, ‘Man, I hate those ads against you. It’s not right, it’s not worthy of us,'” Lamb added.

“There was just a little bit of burnout on that type of campaigning before the president even got here,” he said.

Republicans spent more than $10 million in the district to boost Saccone, and Trump himself made a personal appearance to campaign for the GOP state rep in the district last weekend. 

Lamb, who leads by 641 ballots with 100 percent of precincts reporting, declared victory Tuesday night. More than 1,000 absentee ballots remained uncounted Tuesday night, with election officials vowing to finish the count as soon as possible.

Trump won Pennsylvania’s 18th District by a 20-point margin over Democrat Hillary Clinton in 2016, and election analysts have looked to Tuesday’s performance by Lamb as an indicator for Democratic performance in the fall midterm elections.