JD Vance's victory proves the old GOP has been transformed

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Karl Rove: Ohio is becoming more Republican

Fox News contributor Karl Rove explains the key to JD Vance winning the Ohio GOP Senate primary and predicts Republican wins in the upcoming midterm elections.

The victory of JD Vance in the raucous Ohio GOP senate primary sets the tone for a midterm success that will include a larger number of unique, independent and successful candidates who will win their races due to their own abilities and association with Donald Trump, and not because of their fealty to Washington, Republicans or the support from major corporations. In fact, a growing number of these successful candidates ran against the traditional national powers. When they come to the Capitol they will comprise the first Republican majority wholly independent of the normal elite power structures. 

This could be the most exciting aspect of this year’s Big Red Wave -- victorious candidates who are healthy from giving up the junk food of corporate PAC checks and the largess of most of the big money players who usually finance establishment Republican victories and the resulting carefully constructed caution that always follows. Corporate America has bet on the Democratic Party before, but that former Democratic Party was never this extreme nor opposed to basic pro-business policies.   

Many of these companies broke with Republican politicians over GOP insistence on voter I.D. These companies have accepted the left wing orthodoxy that photo I.D.s are racist and so they also lavish financial support to BLM umbrella groups that foment racial discord. 

TRUMP-BACKED JD VANCE WINS TUMULTUOUS SENATE GOP PRIMARY SHOWDOWN IN OHIO

BLM’s top policy goal of defunding police has morphed into an insane corporate grudge match to deny funds to Republicans who want to follow state and local election laws. 

Ohio GOP Senate candidate J.D. Vance speaks at a rally in Newark, Ohio. (Fox News)

For a time this insanity broke my heart.  Now I know that the only way they will learn is to be humiliated at the ballot box like they were on Tuesday night after the results in Ohio.

Just having a senator being called "JD" could be a revolutionary in and of itself.  However, the fact that this soon-to-be senator will have the resources and political standing to simply listen to his own constituents and block out other voices is sweet music to a Republic that has been hijacked by woke elites and the corporations who fear them.

Vance is a most unique candidate.  His best-selling book, "Hillbilly Elegy," is on the shelves of those who could see the blue-collar revolt building as economic opportunities dissipated throughout rural America and drug abuse and dependence became epidemic. 

Ohio Republican Senate nominee J.D. Vance speaks to supporters after winning a contentious and expensive primary, in Cincinnati, Ohio on May 3, 2022. (Tyler Olson/Fox News)? (Fox News?)

I read JD’s book while in the Virginia mountains, and as we got to know our new friends and neighbors there, the plight outlined in his moving account seemed more tragic when real faces could be associated with his major themes.  I never met any member of JD’s family but I feel like I know their kin.

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JD’s victory is even more impressive when you consider the caliber of those he bested:  Mike Gibbons, a self-funding businessman; Jane Timken, the former state party chair who hails from a much-respected political family, and Josh Mandel whom CPAC had endorsed in previous races and is a smart and respected former state Treasurer (CPAC was neutral in this race.) 

The president’s gutsy endorsement of the underdog will and should get the credit for Vance’s come-from-behind win.  Donald Trump, Jr. and a bevy of Trump surrogates barnstormed across Ohio to make MAGA’s choice clear. 

FILE – Senate candidate JD Vance, left, greets former President Donald Trump at a rally at the Delaware County Fairgrounds, Saturday, April 23, 2022, in Delaware, Ohio, to endorse Republican candidates ahead of the Ohio primary on May 3. (AP)

What’s more impressive is that the major candidates made very aggressive appeals for Trump’s support in "Apprentice"-style mini summits at Mar-a-Lago with each candidate making their best pitch. 

In the end Vance’s message and unique candidacy, together with his tight relationships with Missouri Republican Sen. Josh Hawley and Don, Jr., proved irresistible to the former president who looks more and more likely to fire up his phone and his newly retooled jet to torture the swamp with a retaliatory run for a final term. 

VANCE CALLS FOR GOP UNITY AFTER MAJOR COMEBACK IN OHIO SENATE PRIMARY

But the all too obvious story here is the impact of Trump on primaries and the eventual success of his strategy in the midterms. However, what is less understood or discussed is how quickly the GOP, which never changes, has. 

This could be the most enduring legacy of the Trump years. It is not so much that he drained the swamp, he just exposed it.  It could also be argued that Trump finished the job of breaking down Washington that Reagan started 50 years ago. 

For the political class of Washington the Trump era was a bad dream that they strongly believe is forever in the rearview mirror. 

They believe Biden is a return to normalcy and that the next presidential contest will include a mannerly Republican they can abide because the party platform will go back to being bait only used to deceptively snare enough votes without any intention of it guiding action (echoes of McCain and Romney with a side of Liz Cheney.)

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Wiser eyes can see that the GOP has been transformed.  Across the country Trump and his allies are the standard, and even those who are independent of America First understand that America is in a dire situation that is not of Trump’s making but due to the radical lurch to the left by the Democrats, educational institutions, culture creators and corporate elitists being poorly advised by the Zuckerbucks bunglers at the Chamber of Commerce and the Business Roundtable. 

The GOP was established by moral revolutionaries who wished to upend the economic status quo by emancipating slaves. The Republican Party was willing to champion both a moral and a sound economic cause. 

Today’s GOP is about to rediscover its founding purpose as dozens of independent candidates are on the road to victory paved by a dedication to fulfil past Republican promises  all financed by thousands of smaller donors and a vast new generation of independent-minded conservative activists.

Soon JD Vance will be joined by other independent, wealthy and or famous GOP stalwarts from Arizona, North Carolina, Georgia and other races that will become competitive as we get close to November.

Many predicted that the lack of movement in the Senate would discourage top tier candidates from running, but instead the Senate’s paralysis has motivated Republican candidates to run in an effort to make real change and give America a lifeline. 

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But JD Vance deserves praise for being the improbable frontrunner in the important state of Ohio. May his victory in the fall be the wake up call to both the left on just how unpopular they are and to the standard operating procedures of the establishment GOP which has squandered too many chances to make the fight. 

Congrats to our Hillbilly Senator, and to the many allies who will be joining him. 

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