College professor David Brat’s primary win in Virginia’s 7th congressional district caught the political world by surprise, particularly the man he defeated, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor. But a close look at the VA-07 terrain shows that Mr. Brat had a few points in his favor going in.
The seventh sprawls across 10 counties west, east and primarily north of the state capital of Richmond and is made up of lots of exurban communities. As the American Communities Project at American University has noted, those exurban communities have been good for the tea party so far in 2014. CONT.
Dante Chinni (American U.), Wall Street Journal