RLC Endorsed Phil Moffett Falls Short in Kentucky
Wednesday, May 18th, 2011Originally published at RLC.org
In Kentucky’s Republican gubernatorial primary, RLC endorsed insurgent candidate Phil Moffett, despite performing better than expected, wasn’t able to beat his establishment opponent, State Senate President, David Williams. Upon first glance at the results with 70% of precincts reporting and Moffett down by about 7%, I was wondering where the vaunted Kentucky tea party network that propelled Senator Paul into office was. I was actually on the phone with Dave Nalle earlier when I went to my favorite source, Twitter, and did a #KYGov search to find the aforementioned information. Looking at what I unearthed, I said to Dave, “I’m honestly stunned that anyone who voted for Paul wouldn’t also vote for Moffett”. After further researching the dynamics however, it turns out there were various factors at play that made for very different races, despite the candidate’s similar ideology and being the tea party insurgents pitted against the establishment.
In fact, one of the first articles I came across when I googled Phil Moffett, directly answered the question I had rhetorically posed to Dave. “Why Phil Moffett Is Not Rand Paul”, written by Kevin Brennan at The National Journal, provided immense clarification regarding their differences.
The first issue, and one that is always central in any race, was Moffett’s problem with name recognition. Despite marketing himself as Senator Paul’s heir apparent, there’s no doubt that Ron Paul’s network is what initially provided his son with momentum. That, of course, leads into Moffett’s second problem; fundraising – which the elder Paul also aided his son with greatly. Williams ultimately outspent Moffett 10-1, which speaks volumes about Moffett’s lack of traction in the money raising area. Additionally, Moffett wasn’t able to capture Paul’s official endorsement, because Williams was also supported Paul against Grayson in 2010.
Rand Paul’s national network, combined with media fueled fervor over whether the Senate would be turned over to the Republicans, was also undoubtedly an advantage for him that Moffett lacked. Although Moffett’s campaign and allies such as Western Representation PAC tried to pitch the storyline that Moffett’s campaign was a national one because this GOP primary was the only one in 2011 in which the victor would face off with a pro Obama, Democrat incumbent Governor, creating national fervor in an off year over a primary that the media cares little about turned out to be nearly impossible.