R-MC Professor Goes to Congress: But Which One? By Lauren Bell and brian Turner National and indeed international media of Disability Services at the College as their candidate made the story descended onto the campus of Randolph- also about Randolph-Macon. Macon College in Ashland the morning after What explains Brat’s victory? National media focused on the surprising upset in the 7th congressional conservatives’ unhappiness with the House GOP leadership’s apparent district’s Republican primary, hoping to willingness to compromise with the Obama administration on issues find intriguing story lines about a most like immigration and debt. These issues were raised by the Brat unexpected general election contest between campaign, but our sense is that a more important factor was that Cantor two R-MC professors. With few students on appeared distant from his voters, a classic case of “losing touch with campus in the summer, reporters walked our the folks back home.” Randolph-Macon student Elliot Meyer has been leafy campus looking for someone besides shadowing the Brat campaign as part of a research project directed other reporters to interview. The college bell by Lauren Bell, and noted that candidate Brat did not emphasize the was made famous overnight, and faculty immigration issue on the stump. What Meyer has found is that the members like us were inundated with both number of Tea Party identifiers in a district is related to the likelihood press inquiries and e-mail messages from of a primary challenge, and that the Seventh District saw an impressive friends and colleagues across the country. growth in Tea Party groups since 2010. (The Canadian Press declared Economics professor Dave Brat’s Meyer “the college kid who forecasted the electoral earthquake that primary victory made incumbent Eric rattled U.S. politics.”) Dave Brat was able to tap that growing source of Cantor the first sitting House Majority support crucial in a low-turnout election like a primary. Leader to lose a re-election bid, let alone a But Brat also benefitted from Cantor’s own missteps. It was primary contest. Indeed, few members of the Cantor’s anti-Brat advertising blitz that made Brat a household name House of Representatives lose in primaries. and a viable challenger. Moreover, Cantor’s campaign staff trusted According to Robert Boatright, author of polls it commissioned but that did not account for ’s open Getting Primaried (University of Turner primaries. Shown the resulting poll results that indicated he’d win by Press, 2014), only three or four incumbents a large margin, Cantor spent election morning in Washington, DC, not fall victim in primaries each election cycle. Brat’s convincing win by in the district. eleven percentage points, followed by Cantor’s resignation as Majority Looking forward to the general election, prospects for Professor Leader and the presumed impact the election had on policy issues Brat appear good. The district was drawn to benefit Republicans, and ranging from immigration to Medicaid expansion was certainly enough generally votes that way, although in recent elections Democratic to make big headlines. But the additional discovery that the Democrats candidates ( in 2008 and 2012, in 2012, and had just selected , an Associate Professor and Director Wayne Powell running against Cantor in 2012) have polled over 40%, and

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