We Did it: Inside West Virginia’s nasty GOP primary

Mar 28, 2022

TopLine

Rep. David McKinley is pictured.

Rep. David McKinley is pictured. | AP Photo

TAKE ME HOME, COUNTRY ROADS — Republican Reps. Alex Mooney and David McKinley are waging a brutal primary battle in West Virginia, after redistricting slashed the number of House seats in their home state.

The McKinley-Mooney battle is one of five member-on-member primary match-ups this cycle caused by the once-in-a-decade redrawing of congressional maps. West Virginia lost a House seat, pitting the incumbent Republicans against one another in the May 10 primary.

The House colleagues, now opponents, wasted no time getting nasty on the airwaves. Mooney has attacked McKinley as a "RINO" and a liar in TV ads, while McKinley went on the air calling Mooney a " political prostitute" and a carpetbagger. Both have tied their opponent to President Joe Biden, and highlighted their own ties to former President Donald Trump. Mooney has so far spent $686,000 on TV ads, while McKinley has spent $598,000.

The primary will likely decide who represents the deep-red WV-02 district. And it will also provide a test of Trump's endorsement power. Trump backed Mooney in November, and the Club for Growth endorsed him the next day, bashing McKinley's vote on Biden's infrastructure package. Meanwhile, McKinley has the endorsement of GOP Gov. Jim Justice.

There are six weeks until primary day in West Virginia. Plenty of GOP primary voters are still up for grabs, according to a recent poll. McKinley led Mooney by 5 percentage points in a North Star Opinion research poll conducted for the West Virginia Chamber of Commerce, although 25 percent of voters were undecided. McKinley had 38 percent and Mooney had 33 percent.

One big question looming over the primary is whether Trump will get more involved to boost his candidate before voters head to the polls. Trump has kept close watch over his endorsed candidates in other states, recently dropping Senate hopeful Mo Brooks in Alabama.

"You'd have to ask the president that," Mooney campaign general consultant Mark Harris told Score, asked about the prospect of a Trump visit. "We'd love to have him."

TV and endorsements aside, the candidates are running in new territory — figuratively and literally. Republican primaries are still relatively new in West Virginia, which has shifted from a blue state to a red state over the last two decades.

"We haven't had a lot of competitive Republican campaigns at this level," West Virginia GOP political consultant Greg Thomas told Score. "And Republican intensity is really high. It's everywhere, and it's among all kinds of Republicans."

Plus, Mooney and McKinley are each running on new turf in the new WV-02, which encompasses the northern half of the state.

"McKinley is going to do extremely well in the Northern Panhandle and the River Valley, all the way down to Parkersburg, and Mooney is going to do very well out in the Eastern Panhandle, regardless of how much money is spent in those areas for and against their opponents," said Thomas, who worked for McKinley in 2010 but is not working for either campaign this cycle. "Typically the Eastern Panhandle doesn't come out as much in a primary, but to be quite honest, they've never had a reason to."

Good Monday morning. Email me at smurray@politico.com and follow me on Twitter at @stephanie_murr.

Email the rest of the POLITICO Campaigns team at sshepard@politico.com, zmontellaro@politico.com and amutnick@politico.com. Follow them on Twitter: @POLITICO_Steve, @ZachMontellaro and @allymutnick.

Days until the CA-22 special election primary: 8

Days until the Indiana and Ohio primaries: 36

Days until the Texas runoff: 57

Days until the general election: 225

Days until the 2024 election: 953

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CAMPAIGN INTEL

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— "Ohio Redistricting Commission stares down another deadline to redraw state legislative maps," by Andrew Tobias, Cleveland Plain Dealer: "The Ohio Redistricting Commission is coming down to the wire as it faces a Monday court-ordered deadline to draw new state legislative maps in time for the May 3 election. On Sunday, the commission, a panel of state elected officials, considered three sets of rough draft maps provided by two mapmaking consultants the commission hired last week."

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AS SEEN ON TV

— Alabama GOP Gov. Kay Ivey is airing a new gubernatorial campaign ad that features two men at a shooting range who highlight her policy positions. "Kay kicks so much liberal butt, I bet her leg's tired," one of the men says. Ivey fires at a target and turns to the camera. "No step too high for a high-stepper," Ivey says.

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Presidential Big Board

HINDSIGHT IS 2020 — "Ginni Thomas pressed for GOP lawmakers to protest 2020 election results," by Scott Wong, NBC News: "Shortly after the 2020 election, Virginia 'Ginni' Thomas, the conservative activist and wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, sent an email to an aide to a prominent House conservative saying she would have nothing to do with his group until his members go 'out in the streets,' a congressional source familiar with the exchange told NBC News."

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