He’s the speaker of the House and was re-elected to a ninth term by Wisconsin’s 1st District with 63 percent of the vote, but now Paul Ryan is under attack from the Right after refusing to back presumptive GOP nominee Donald Trump and embracing policies that have angered the conservative base.
Paul Nehlen, a water filtration company CEO, has launched a campaign to defeat Ryan in the Badger State’s August 9 GOP primary.
While he has nowhere near the name recognition or popularity enjoyed by Ryan, Nehlen has received the high-profile endorsement of former Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin. His website, Dumppaulryan.com, highlights his nod from Palin, and Nehlen has been driving around the district in a yellow dump truck advertising his bid, although he has yet to collect the required signatures to get onto the ballot.
Nehlen said Ryan has “betrayed Wisconsin’s 1st District” by supporting the recent Trade Promotion Authority measure that will enable new trade deals that many believe will hurt American jobs.
“It was the final straw for me,” Nehlen said of Ryan’s TPA endorsement. “It will kill the economy in this district, never mind the rest of the nation.”
Palin, meanwhile, turned against Ryan after he declined to immediately back Trump when he became the apparent nominee. “I will do whatever I can for Paul Nehlen,” Palin said on CNN’s “State of the Union.”
Ryan’s role as speaker makes him one of the most powerful lawmakers in the nation. But voters have occasionally tossed out their high-ranking representatives, most recently in 2014, when House Majority Leader Eric Cantor was defeated in his own GOP primary by Dave Brat, a college professor who ran to the right of Cantor.
Brat’s victory shocked the political world and caught Cantor completely flat-footed.
“I think Paul Ryan is soon to be Cantored, as in Eric Cantor,” Palin predicted on CNN.
Political operatives in Wisconsin say there is no comparison between Ryan and Cantor. Wisconsin GOP strategists are chuckling at the prospect of Nehlen getting anywhere near the support he would need to pose a serious threat to Ryan.
Not only is Ryan the speaker and former Republican vice presidential nominee, he is deeply involved in his district and responsive to his constituents, say those allied with him.
Ryan skips the weekend fundraisers, for example, and instead flies home every weekend to Janesville, where he was raised and has extensive roots.
“Paul Ryan’s boots on the ground are just short of an army,” Wisconsin GOP strategist Brandon Scholz told the Washington Examiner. “Nobody is going to wake up on the day of the primary and say, ‘What happened to Paul Ryan?’ These guys are intense and on it.”
In 2014, Ryan’s primary challenger Jeremy Ryan received 6 percent of the vote and ran on the premise that he might confuse voters by sharing the same last name.
But national political strategists say Ryan may have to take this year’s challenger more seriously, thanks to Trump. Ryan could be hurt if he does not endorse Trump, whose anti-establishment candidacy has attracted millions of enthusiastic voters, although not a plurality of Republicans.
“The only way Ryan could get beaten in a primary is if he still refuses to endorse Trump by August 9 and he’s seen as enabling Hillary Clinton,” said David Wasserman, who analyzes House races as an editor at the non-partisan Cook Political Report. “In such an event, Paul Nehlen would become a national cause celebre for the Right and it would be a real race.
“In fact, this primary is the main reason Ryan will probably have no choice but to eventually support Trump,” he added.
It would not be unprecedented in modern times for voters to toss out their own representative who is serving as speaker. It happened in 1994, when Speaker Tom Foley, a Democrat, lost his re-election bid in Washington’s 5th Congressional District.
The Nehlen campaign sees an opportunity. A spokesman told the Examiner they are “very confident” he will have enough signatures for a place on the ballot.
Ryan’s campaign team points out their candidate is popular in district polls, active in the community and not terribly worried about losing to Nehlen. They also point out that Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, not Trump, won the most District 1 votes in the GOP primary by a margin of 51-32 percent.
“People in southern Wisconsin know Paul Ryan and they know what he stands for. Janesville is his home, and his commitment will always be to the people he represents,” Ryan campaign spokesman Zach Roday told the Examiner.
