donald trumpThe group’s revenge tour hit a snag Virginia on Tuesday night during the state’s primary.
The former president endorsed retired Navy SEAL John McGuire, a GOP state senator and challenger to incumbent Bob Good, after he committed the irredeemable sin of supporting Florida governor Ron DeSantis in the Republican presidential primary.
Both Virginians fought for Trump’s approval and, in a comedy-worthy scene, attended Trump’s secret trial on the same day in New York last month in an attempt to get it.
On Wednesday morning, things weren’t looking good for the MAGA candidate. McGuire had just a 309-vote lead and the race remains very close — hardly the kind of blowout a Trump-backed candidate should enjoy, especially in an area with tons of deep red, rural pockets.
It’s a surprising result, as the odds seemed to be stacked against Good. Not only was Trump against him, but so was former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy whose political action committee gave $10,000 to McGuire. That money was payback for Good joining Matt Gaetz and six other Republicans in ousting McCarthy as speaker of the House in October.
Good should have fit the MAGA mold perfectly, as he resembles many of the Tea Party hellraisers who dominated the conservative wing of the House Republican conference even before Trump came along.
He ousted an incumbent Republican in the 2020 election who presided over a same-sex wedding. A year later, on the House floor, Good said, “Almost everything that plagues our society can be attributed to failure to follow God’s law and its rules and definition of marriage and family.”
But Trump turned against him after supporting DeSantis. Good was also captured on video last year in a private conversation saying that Trump could lose to Biden.
But the Good-McGuire dispute reveals that Trump cannot always decisively defeat his perceived enemies and oust them in favor of filling the Republican ranks with acolytes.
It also appears that a considerable number of people in Good’s district, like him, consistently hold Republican leadership accountable. Far from being punished for voting against Republican bills and causing gridlock in the House, Tuesday’s primaries show that many voters want to reward his behavior by keeping him in Washington.
If Good ultimately wins the primary, he will likely retain the House seat for Republicans in November. The non-partisan Cook Political Reportclassifies the seat as “Safe Republican.”
While this is good news for House Republicans, a good victory would be bad news for Trump.
If Trump wins and Republicans control the House, Good won’t feel the need to fall in line if he feels he’s betraying conservative values. Good has consistently voted against Republican spending bills and even against granting aid to Israel, despite unwavering support from Republicans.
Good values fiscal responsibility and balanced budgets – traditional conservative values.
In a potential Trump administration, Good won’t agree with the former president if he thinks Trump’s spending bills will go over budget.
But the number of Virginia congressmen is dwindling — even Republicans who once complained about debt limit increases, like Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, now vote for debt limit increases without consequence. Their loyalty to Trump protects them from criticism. Conservatives who cared about fiscal values rather than Trump’s arrogance or election denial, like Ken Buck in Colorado and Justin Amash in Michigan, have disappeared.
But Good’s valiant fight in the primaries shows that there is still a constituency for this type of Republican.
And the close race shows that Trump’s endorsement is not an automatic guarantee of victory. If Good somehow manages to win in Virginia, he will have considerable leverage against Trump in a potential future administration. Now, he can always say that voters in Virginia’s 5th District preferred him, even after Trump chose a challenger.
