Is there exit polling that Sarvis took more from Cuccinelli ? McAuliffe internals showed that they would split the first 5% and after that be 2-1 from GOP voters. But I wonder if there wasn’t more of a Dem protest effect since the race ended up a lot tighter than those polls were showing.
Registered Libertarians that voted for Sarvis are delusional, so it’s hard to make sense of their motives.
Regarding the narrow margin, prolly a combination of protest and Tea Party as you suggest.