It's hard to say for sure but it's possible that Messer and Rokita split the mouth-foaming GOP primary vote, allowing Braun to win.
Finally I predict something right on this forum! I'm actually surprised at how accurate I am too right down to saying that Messer and Rokita would split their faction's vote. They almost got the exact same percentage!
This is a bad take. All three's ads were really Drumpf-y, but honestly with Messer's less so. Braun's were all about career politicians, draining the swamp, the wall, trade deals, etc.
I'll be honest, I had a hard time telling Rokita and Messer apart throughout the whole campaign. That's why I kind of lumped them together. Braun to me came off as the less desperate candidate since he was an outsider and seemed to have appeal beyond desperately trying to appeal to Trump's base like "Trump-Pence endorsed" Rokita did.
Here is something to consider. If Trump is to have a long term impact on the party, then it will far more likely come in the form of candidates like Mike Braun than anyone else.
A lot of movement conservative types are trying to do what they did to the tea party ,and that is co-op it and milk it dry to advance their agenda. That is what you saw with Rokita and Messer. Ten years ago, Messer would have been winning this primary, hell just six years ago, running as the most Pencian social conservative candidate and with others trying to out social conservative him. Now they are trying to out Trump each other.
Voters actually do want creativity, and leadership. They don't want a cardboard cutout who will just spout the same talking points and vote 100% in loyalty to some movement conservative think tank's score card.
The same thing happened in NC, where Scott Dacey spent a crap ton of money and get demolished by Walter Jones. I saw his adds here, and it is the same basic ad that every previous movement conservative has run against Jones and every time they get their head severed and handed to them on a platter. The add basically goes like this, "Jones votes with Pelosi the most of any Republican... (Remember "They vote with each other 100% of the time in Indiana and Braun used to be a Democrat lines)... The real Trump conservative is Scott Dacey... "
At some point, when the results like these mount, you have to ask yourself what does Trumpism really mean. Is it a tea party House member who puts on a red hat or a so-con who starts calling his opponent lying Todd? Or is it a businessman who opposes illegal immigration, is skeptical of free trade and criticizes conformity in voting (and by extension thought) and used to be a Democrat? Or perhaps we should just drop the word Trumpism and find something else to call this that can form an umbrella that includes both Trump and Braun, whether it be populism or some other term.
Trump won in part because he intentionally or unintentionally zig zagged his way to a certain groups of voters. Lumbering communities, dairy communities, post-industrial towns, seniors, and even pro-Obamacare working class white voters, who yes used to be a Democrat ten years ago.
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/31/upshot/donald-trumps-strongest-supporters-a-certain-kind-of-democrat.htmlWe can spend hours arguing over semantics and style, but the simple fact is Mike Braun won for the same reason that Trump did, driven largely by the same voters (though not entirely, Braun was less antagonistic towards moderates and college educated voters).
Poll
