Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush speaks at the RedState Gathering on Saturday in Atlanta. (David Goldman/AP)
After this past weekend’s gathering convened by the conservative Web site RedState, one candidate emerged as the dominant news story: John Kasich.
Hahaha. No. It was Donald Trump, of course.
But lost in the wall-to-wall Trump coverage was this little headline, way down on page A15 of the New York Times.
In this story, Trip Gabriel describes how Bush was actually reasonably well-received at the RedState convention, even though its attendees were thought to be “too conservative” for a candidate like Bush.
Why is this important? It’s important because of what the invisible primary entails. It’s not really about a debate. Or a Twitter fight. Or, for Pete’s sake, the polls. It’s about building a broad base of support among a party’s activists and leaders.
[Why you should ignore the Republican presidential primary polls]
For this reason, as Seth Masket noted, equally if not more important than last week’s debate was the endorsement that Scott Walker picked up from the speaker of the Minnesota House of Representatives.
And for this reason, it’s arguably more important how Bush was received at RedState than that Trump was disinvited from RedState. Primary candidates need to demonstrate support outside of one’s traditional base of support within the party — and, for Bush, movement conservatives are definitely not his base.
So is the point that RedState will endorse Bush? No. Has Bush won over conservatives? No, as Gabriel’s article also illustrates. Is Bush going to be the nominee? It’s too early to say, although he is the front-runner or close to the front on the metrics that matters most.
The point is not to let the truly significant events in the invisible primary get drowned out by the newest, click-worthiest controversy involved Trump.
