Former President Barack Obama’s first 2018 midterm election endorsements are more significant for whom he omitted than for the 81 he favored, including vulnerable, incumbent red-state Democratic senators and some of the party’s far-Left stars.

“Today I’m proud to endorse such a wide and impressive array of Democratic candidates – leaders as diverse, patriotic, and big-hearted as the America they’re running to represent,” Obama tweeted Wednesday.

“I’m confident that, together, they’ll strengthen this country we love by restoring opportunity, repairing our alliances and standing in the world, and upholding our fundamental commitment to justice, fairness, responsibility, and the rule of law. But first, they need our votes.”

Obama’s “first wave” of endorsements included California Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom’s (D) gubernatorial bid, former Minority Leader of the Georgia House of Representatives Stacey Abrams’ (D) gubernatorial campaign, and former Hillary Clinton for President campaign co-chairman J.B. Pritzker’s (D) gubernatorial campaign in Illinois.

But Obama endorsed only one U.S. Senate candidate — Rep. Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.) in her quest to oust vulnerable incumbent Sen. Dean Heller (R-Nev.) — thus snubbing half a dozen prominent red-state Democratic senators.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) also failed to receive Obama’s endorsement, which followed on the heels of a major snub she suffered in July when the California Democratic Party declined to endorse her.

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The California party organization instead endorsed Feinstein’s progressive challenger, state Sen. Kevin de León (D), with 65 percent of its vote. Feinstein (pictured above left) has served in the Senate since 1992, and before was mayor of San Francisco. She is 85 years old.

Among the vulnerable red-state incumbent Democrats Obama ignored are senators Joe Manchin (W.Va.), Heidi Heitkamp (N.D.) Claire McCaskill (Mo.) and Joe Donnelly (Ind.).

These senators face tough re-election battles in states Trump won in 2016. The president is also pressuring them to back his second U.S. Supreme Court nominee in his high-stakes confirmation battle, Judge Brett Kavanaugh. Donnelly, Heitkamp and Manchin (pictured above center) supported Trump’s first nominee, Justice Neil Gorsuch, in 2017.

Obama also failed to endorse Rep. Beto O’Rourke’s (D-Texas) bid to oust Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), even though that Senate contest is now unexpectedly close, according to recent polls.

The biggest surprise among Obama’s 2018 endorsements is the one he didn’t make, snubbing New York’s suddenly everywhere 28-year-old avowed Democratic socialist Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (pictured above right).

Ocasio-Cortez defeated 10-term incumbent Rep. Joe Crowley (D-N.Y.), the heavily funded chairman of the House Democratic Caucus. Ocasio-Cortez is a member of the Democratic Socialists of America and worked as a bartender less than a year ago.

After Ocasio-Cortez began calling for abolishment of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency — a radical position formerly espoused only on the Democratic Party’s furthest-Left fringe — a handful of Democratic lawmakers and liberal mainstream media talking heads joined suit.

Related: Dems Are ‘Being Boxed in’ by Ocasio-Cortez’s Progressive Socialism

Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel marveled Wednesday during an interview on Fox News’ “Outnumbered Overtime” that “there’s a lot of people not on” Obama’s initial endorsement list.

“In fact, I think this list is more interesting for the omissions than [for] the people that he put on it,” McDaniel said. “I mean, almost every major Senate candidate across the country is not on this list. He’s missing a lot of key house races — even house races [of states] where Hillary Clinton won.”

But McDaniel said she viewed the 2016 presidential and congressional elections as “a repudiation of Barack Obama.”

“We had a stagnant economy, we had a country that was failing,” McDaniel said. “And I don’t think a lot of candidates want his endorsement, and it’s interesting to see how many of them are not on his list that are in contested races across this country.”

But since the Democratic party is “going further and further left” and is “divided” heading into the 2018 midterm elections, McDaniel said she “will be interested to see how many of these candidates tout” Obama’s endorsement.

“They’re floundering — they don’t have a leader of their party. More than anything, they don’t have a message,” McDaniel said. “Resist and obstruct is not a message. It’s a message of not getting anything done.”

(photo credit, homepage and article images: Diane Feinstein, CC BY 2.0David Lee/YouTube)