He will face Ryan Solen, who won the Democratic primary over Tom Breu.
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Trump had praised Nehlen for running “a very good campaign” and didn’t endorse Ryan until last Friday. Louise Bauman, a Janesville, Wis., voter, said there’s no way that Ryan – their two-heartbeats-away-from-the-White-House and hometown hero – could lose his seat in Congress.
Ryan said the results were a vote for a politics that is “inclusive, not divisive”, and not “mean”. “That’s the beginning of a fight we’re ready to get started”. “The outcome is exactly what we were hoping for”.
He calls Nehlen a “desperate candidate” who did desperate things for attention.
Despite the expected large margin of victory, the race for the 1st Congressional District in southeast Wisconsin became the center of attention a week ago when Trump refused to endorse Ryan during an interview with the Washington Post. Trump relented just three days later after coming under criticism from GOP leaders, but the burst of publicity was priceless for Nehlen.
“I am humbled and honored that Wisconsinites in the 1st Congressional District support my efforts to keep fighting on their behalf”, said a statement Ryan released late Tuesday.
But I will tell you this, I fully suspect when I win later today – Paul Ryan’s machine will try to get the Democrat elected.
Ryan’s victory is a loss for the GOP’s populist wing, some of whom had criticized him as insufficiently conservative.
Ryan has been trying to downplay the race.
It’s primary day in Wisconsin on Tuesday.
Trump tweeted his thanks to Nehlen for supporting him during his dust up with the Muslim American parents of a USA soldier killed in Iraq.
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Ryan was hoping to avoid the same kind of shocking loss that ended then-House Majority Leader Eric Cantor’s political career in 2014, when he lost to a tea party challenger in the primary. The only other time he had a primary challenger was in his first race, in 1998, when he won with 81 percent of the vote. Monday, he made a stop at a manufacturing company in Racine. He challenged Ryan to an arm-wrestling match if he wouldn’t debate him. Nehlen received endorsements from the likes of Sarah Palin, Michelle Malkin and Ann Coulter. But they also could be read as an implicit critique of Trump, whose tone and approach to politics are far more slashing and confrontational than Ryan’s.
