Will Republicans find silver lining in Cantor defeat?

Since everyone is a bona fide political analyst these days, there will be a plethora of explanations of why Republican U.S. House Majority Leader Eric Cantor lost the nomination for re-election in his Virginia district in his own party primary.

I would like to suggest that the loss, while a real one obviously for Mr. Cantor personally and his leadership colleagues in the  U.S. house, just might be a net plus for his political party.

The primary issue as the provocation for his defeat was clearly his leadership role in proposed immigration reform.

Mr. Cantor won his primary in 2012 with more than 70% of the vote, and had for years enjoyed broad GOP support in his  district, including among the very groups who appeared to turn against him this time. Since immigration reform was the major issue for most of these latter GOP voters, it is inescapable to avoid the conclusion that immigration reform was the “catalyst” in this political story.

First, let me repeat what I have consistently written in recent years: I strongly support immigration reform, and I oppose any notion of blanket returning current “illegal” immigrants to  their nation of origin (but illegal criminal immigrants should be expelled). The 10 million-plus “illegals” currently living in the U.S. should be given a legal status, and be required to pay  taxes, and to observe all the other rules of those who legally live in this country.

At the same time, I strongly support a  massive overhaul of border control, and effective measures to stop any more illegal immigration now. Furthermore, conferring legal status should not mean instant or even quick citizenship status.

This was similar, I thought, to the intentions of the U.S. house leadership, including John Boehner and Eric Cantor, in their continuing quest to fashion a reasonable, fair and prudent reform of U.S. immigration policy. I favor immigration reform, but I also recognize the responsibility of political leaders to persuade voters that reform is good and necessary.

The problem with Boehner and Cantor, despite other excellent leadership qualities, has been their less-than-stellar public communications on this and other issues, thus often isolating themselves not only from members of their own caucus in the U.S. house, but also with significant numbers of grass roots voters in their own party across the nation.

So-called “tea party” activists and voters have often been identified by an unsympathetic liberal media as the “culprits” in the current divisions in the Republican Party, and at the  outset of the 2014 mid-term election campaign, this media attempted to exacerbate GOP voter disagreements into a successful insurrection against the party “establishment,” thus making conservative success at the polls in November, 2014 less likely (as happened in some U.S. senate races in 2010  and 2012).

In the primary season so far, this for the most part has NOT happened. Particularly, in competitive 2014 U.S. senate races, Republican and conservative voters across the country have resisted the impulse to nominate ultimately weak candidates. In fact, on the same day that Mr. Cantor lost, Lindsay Graham  of South Carolina won his primary with more than 50% of the  vote. Senator Graham has been criticized by some activists for not being conservative enough. In Mississippi, incumbent GOP Senator Thad Cochran, similarly criticized, has been forced  into a run-off against a “tea party” conservative opponent,  and might lose the nomination as a result, but his opponent would still be the favorite to keep the seat in Republican hands in that very conservative state.

Democrats and their media friends, of course, would like the Cantor defeat to re-ignite the “tea party” revolution, and divide the Republican Party. One issue that might have helped do this was trying to force immigration reform in Congress before the mid-term elections. This issue is no longer on the table after Mr. Cantor’s defeat, and thus might be a silver lining for the GOP.

Mr. Boehner and Mr. Cantor both led their caucus into abandoning another government shutdown, another refusal to raise the debt ceiling, and more fruitless attempts to repeal Obamacare, so that the 2014 election could be a national referendum on President Obama, his administration and his policies.

Their success with this, however, was followed by a curious determination to force through immigration reform before the  2014 election, thus risking turning off some valuable grass roots support. Whether one agrees with them or not, a number of conservative voters have serious questions about immigration  reform, especially reform designed by the Democrats. Boehner and  Cantor did not made clear the difference between their idea of reform and the liberals’ version of it. Conservative resistance has been loud and ongoing, including in Cantor’s district.

The responsibility for Eric Cantor’s defeat is thus his own. Probably, his leadership role has caused him and his political advisers to  lose touch with his district. There is really no other credible  explanation for a popular and genuinely conservative incumbent  to lose his own party re-nomination by such a wide margin.

Candidly, “tea party” voters needed at least one notable victory in this election cycle, and now they have it. If Republican leaders are skillful, they will not panic, but learn from Mr. Cantor’s  political mistakes, and move on to the election ahead. As I have said many times, the “Tea Party” arose on legitimate economic grievances. A few of them now are show-offs or have tried to take the tea party movement in non-economic directions, but if the Republican Party wants to succeed in 2014 and 2016, it cannot afford to turn these conservative voters off and away.

The primary season is now almost over. Most Republican incumbents have made efforts to appeal to the various factions in their party, and most GOP challengers this year, especially in competitive U.S. senate races, are outstanding. Eric Cantor’s  loss might well be the exception that demonstrates the rule that  this is a year with voter momentum that rejects administration policies in Washington, DC.

Only if the Republican leadership fails to continue its attempts to integrate all of its grass roots voter support, need the defeat  of Eric Cantor be more than just a curious historical footnote.