I think Rush downplayed the significance of this result.
Chris Lee (R) won just last Nov. with 73% of the vote, getting about 150,000 votes back then, whereas Corwin ended up with around 40,000 votes.
Sure, Hochul didn’t crack 50% but she did a lot better than the Democrat who ran in Nov., who got a mere 29% of the vote.
Even if Corwin would have gotten all the Tea Party plant’s votes (doubtful), she might barely have won.
Where did all the Republican voters go? Surely they knew this was a very important election.
Something went very wrong.
This election may have not been as much a repudiation of the Ryan Medicare proposals as it was a Republican backlash against Chris Lee’s abhorrent behavior and resignation in shame.
It just doesn’t make sense that overwhelmingly, voters sent conservatives to D.C. last November to restore fiscal sanity and 6 months later, the voters have done a 180.