On her show Wednesday night MSNBC host Rachel Maddow explained how Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney could hurt other Republican candidates if his image does not improve before November.

“As Mr. Romney has been dropping in the polls, so have been Republican Senate candidates,” she noted.

Romney’s campaign has faced criticism after the release of video where he claimed nearly half of Americans were government-dependent “victims” who paid no taxes and therefore going to vote for Obama. Romney said he would “not to worry about those people” because he could “never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives.”

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His comments, which were published by Mother Jones, appear to have resulted in his own poll numbers going down, as well as the poll numbers of some of his fellow Republicans.

“We are now seeing some of those candidates who stand to maybe lose an otherwise close race thanks to Mitt Romney calling half the country a bunch of lazy moocher bums, we are seeing those Senate candidates flee from Mr. Romney and his rhetoric, at least on this issue,” Maddow said.

Watch video, courtesy of MSNBC, below:

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