WASHINGTON– Rep. Denver Riggleman, R-Va., apparently failed to win re-nomination Sunday. 

Amidst rolling national crises, it was an election that could have only taken place in the Old Dominion. Virginia’s Fifth District spans the Commonwealth north to south — from the NoVA suburbs to the stunning Blue Ridge region to the state border with North Carolina. Its first Congressional election was between two future presidents, James Madison and James Monroe (Madison both won and became president first). Its politics were described to me as a “viper’s nest” by a veteran of the state’s politics Sunday.  

The incumbent Riggleman — a first-termer — fell prey to a drive-thru convention. Bob Good — an associate athletics director at Evangelical flagship Liberty University — ran clearly to Riggleman’s right. The headlines from the Washington Post and others Sunday report that Riggleman was punished by voters for officiating a gay wedding (good for him). While clearly a factor, party veterans cautioned against a sweeping narrative, laying Riggleman’s defeat at the feet of a middling campaign staff and citing other issues, including immigration. 

Riggleman was described by much of the press as a down-the-line Trump supporter. While true if one looks at the Congressional vote record, that interpretation ignores intangibles and certain, inflamed issues. Riggleman, 50, is an affable businessman owner (of a cool distillery), and at ease in House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s GOP. The language he employs focuses on job creation through business partnership and turns the volume down on much of the culture war. 

“The United States is a nation of immigrants,” Riggleman told The Roanoke Times. “There are areas we’re sorely lacking in the job skills market. Certain parts of the district are losing population, so we need workers, we need skilled immigrant workers.” Good disagrees. He told the Times that he desires the abolition of birthright citizenship. He’s derided “anchor babies” and seeks English as the national language. “We’ve got to eliminate illegal immigration and manage legal immigration in a way that puts Americans first, puts our citizens first, American jobs first,” Good told the Times. 

The landscape is complex. Good was described to me as a former NeverTrumper, aligned more with the politics of Ted Cruz — the 2016 runner-up — than President Donald Trump. Indeed, Good is said to be close with the Cruz establishment in the state, helmed by former Attorney General Ken Cuccinnelli — a protestee of Trump’s ascent who has since gone to work for him as a senior immigration official. Focusing too on the now much-quieter grudge match between Trump and Cruz people elides the fact that the two politicians were once quite friendly– and competing over a similar swath of voters. Good’s victory this weekend was a victory of the anti-establishment wing over the party’s establishment. 

Virginia’s GOP selects its candidates by either convention or primary. The former is generally considered to favor grassroots party activists, while the latter the playground of establishment grandees. The reality is more complex, of course, but the rout of Riggleman is an heir in spirit to the defeat of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor in 2014 (in a primary) and the sidelining of Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling in 2013 (through a convention). Riggleman lost Sunday by Coronavirus-era convention. Mandarins in the moderate wing will point out that past conventions have been fiascos. 

The 2013 state convention (which I attended- it was bad) produced a losing statewide ticket. The controversial Cuccinelli and the erratic Rev. E.W. Jackson were nominated for governor and lieutenant governor. The duo helped inspire a credible Libertarian challenge — Northern Virginia tech entrepreneur Robert Sarvis, who was complimented in the Post — and helped the party lose a winnable election. But the 2014 primary was a shot across the bow that presaged Donald Trump’s ascent nationwide. And Brat defeated his general election opponent.

Still, these bloody intramurals have taken place against a backdrop of Virginia falling further and further from Republicans’ grasp. The Grand Old Party has not won the governor’s mansion in Richmond since 2009, the state last voted Republican for president in 2004 and the 2018 midterms saw the erasure of many of its incumbents– including Brat. The outlaw spirit that helps outsider candidates triumph can turn on them once in office. Riggleman’s first foray into Virginia elections was a quixotic race for governor he tongue-in-cheek dubbed “the Whiskey Rebellion.” Critics of his tenure say in Congress he was on autopilot: content to rest on a “kill terrorists and make whiskey” narrative.

The district is winnable for Democrats. Politics aside, procedure is the first hurdle for the Republicans. Good apparently forgot or failed to file correctly with the state Board of Elections. “It recently came to light that Bob Good did not turn in his Statement of Candidate Qualification Form as required for any candidate to be on the November ballot,” Riggleman’s campaign said earlier this month. “Congressman Denver Riggleman did. Bob Good missed the Tuesday, June 9 deadline. This is amateur hour at its finest and shows Bob Good isn’t qualified for Congress.”  

Riggleman’s constituents disagreed.