Nope. I was in the middle of it. Cantor was lazy, and instead of actually campaigning during the primary, decided since he had so much money he would just out ad Dave Brat. Bad move for Cantor. Since Brat was a newcomer with no record, Cantor didn't have much to work with in his ads, so he lied about the record of Brat. The folks who paid attention to the lies in his ads were exactly the same folks who rouse themselves to vote in primaries. Every time they heard another ad by Cantor calling Brat a liberal professor who helped Tim Kaine raise taxes, the more pissed off these folks got, because it wasn't true.
Do you understand? Cantor paid for his own loss.
Yes, there were local conservatives that were early Brat supporters and some of these folks may have been to a Tea Party rally, but while Brat asked for help from the Tea Party, they sent NOT ONE PENNY!
Immigration was but one talking point that Brat used in his stump speech, but it would be quite a stretch to call it a focus of his campaign.
“Immigration was but one talking point that Brat used in his stump speech, but it would be quite a stretch to call it a focus of his campaign.”
I wasn’t there, but I have heard similar - basically that Brat was trying to not be single-issue. But the perception still held...Cantor was twisting arms for Amnesty, and he lost. Good enough for me.