RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel says Rep. Madison Cawthorn 'did the right thing by conceding' after his GOP primary defeat

• RNC Chair McDaniel said Rep. Cawthorn "did the right thing by conceding" his race on Tuesday.
• Cawthorn lost his North Carolina House Republican primary to state Sen. Chuck Edwards.

Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel said that Rep. Madison Cawthorn — who last week lost renomination to his House seat to state Sen. Chuck Edwards in a GOP primary — did "the right thing by conceding" the race.

During an appearance on "Fox News Sunday," McDaniel told host Martha MacCallum that the race between the incumbent North Carolina congressman, Edwards, and several other Republican candidates "was a very well fought" contest.

"Madison had some issues that came out," she said. "He was a rising star in our party and we need to make sure we retain that seat with Edwards, who defeated him. And Madison did the right thing by conceding."

After Cawthorn's primary loss to Edwards, where the congressman was edged out by a 33.4% to 31.9% margin — or by nearly 1,400 votes out of 88,000 ballots cast — he took to Instagram and blamed establishment politicians for his defeat, calling for "Dark MAGA" to be unleashed.

"I am on a mission now to expose those who say and promise one thing yet legislate and work towards another, self-profiteering, globalist goal," Cawthorn wrote. "It's time for the rise of the new right, it's time for Dark MAGA to truly take command."

He added: "The time for genteel politics as usual has come to an end."

When asked about "Dark MAGA," McDaniel said that she didn't know what Cawthorn was referring to.

"I don't know what Dark MAGA is," she told MacCallum. "It sounds like something from 'Star Wars,' like the dark side of the force. I don't know what that is."

She continued: "We need to make sure we retain that seat with Edwards, who defeated him. ... We need to focus on the Democrats. Republicans who are fighting are each constantly — that is not helping us defeat Democrats in November and that needs to be the focus."

Cawthorn — a 26-year-old first-term conservative who was backed by former President Donald Trump — has found himself at the center of numerous controversies since his earliest days in Congress.

During the congressman's first month in Congress, the Charlotte Observer's editorial board called him "an embarrassment."

Cawthorn, who challenged the 2020 presidential election by contesting President Joe Biden's wins in Arizona and Pennsylvania, even after the deadly Capitol riots on January 6, 2021, was also taken to task on CNN as he admitted that the election "was not fraudulent."

In March, the congressman was blasted by members of his own party for suggesting that political elites in Washington had propositioned him to join an orgy and that he observed another prominent leader using cocaine.

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy was especially critical of Cawthorn's comments.

"I just told him he's lost my trust, he's gonna have to earn it back," McCarthy told reporters at the time, per Axios' Alayna Treene. "And I laid out to him everything that I find is unbecoming. He's got a lot of members very upset."

However, McCarthy continued to back Cawthorn in his primary race, and on Wednesday after the congressman's defeat said that his colleague's political career was "not over."

"I want to help him," the California Republican told CNN's Manu Raju. "He had some issues, but he's young and so you don't wish somebody ill."