WASHINGTON (AP) — Senate Republicans reelected South Dakota Sen. John Thune as their leader Tuesday after a tense day of private discussions about steep losses in the midterm elections that cost them their majority.

Thune was always expected to prevail, as he is popular with his GOP colleagues and was running unopposed in the secret-ballot election. But Senate Republicans vented their frustrations in three separate meetings Tuesday after an election wipeout that cost them at least seven Senate seats.

Some Republicans had tried to delay the leadership decision, but the conference voted 31-15 to proceed. Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson led the effort to postpone and walked out when it failed. The closed-door meetings were held in the small Old Senate Chamber with few aides in attendance.

As the conference debated earlier in the day, West Virginia Sen. Jim Justice said “we want to be thoughtful and do the right thing.”

He said there was a “legitimate argument that, good gracious, if we lost as badly as we lost, why would we continue on with the same leadership?”

At the same time, the current GOP leadership “didn’t cause this problem to happen,” Justice said. “They do a good job.”

Republicans’ angst and indecision come as frustrated Republicans are just beginning to reckon with what the election results mean for their future — and for their relationship with President Donald Trump, as voters resoundingly rejected their two years of single-party rule in Congress and the White House. Two additional Senate races remain uncalled in Alaska and Mississippi that could further deplete their numbers.

“I just think that we’ve got a lot of things that we’ve got to think through, and I think that to just rush into this and just ratify all of the same leadership, what message does that send?” Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley told reporters after the first meeting.