David Abrams

Patrick Morrisey just won by far the most expensive gubernatorial primary in West Virginia state history. It was a brutal race with 4 major candidates. Moore Capito was the establishment favorite, with a current U.S. Senator for a mom AND a former Governor for a grandfather. Chris Miller has a Congresswoman for a mom, AND another former Congressman for a grandfather. Mac Warner, the Secretary of State ONLY had a former Chairman of the State GOP for a brother, another brother who was the GOP nominee for Governor, and a member of the House of Delegates for a wife. It’s a good thing voters hate legacy politicians. Morrisey is the state’s AG, but he has been very much outside the establishment, especially in relation to his competitors. The WV media was firmly on the Moore Capito bandwagon. wvmetronews.com/2023/09/06/p… And, Miller was able to write his own check. Morrisey had to outwork his opponents to lead wire-to-wire in fundraising and had to go around the mainstream media to take his message directly to GOP voters. The national media missed the narrative by distilling this race into their lazy take that the only thing which mattered were the culture wars. While there were a number of ads on the gender issue, it was by no means the focus of the Morrisey campaign. Our ads focused on Patrick’s record of accomplishment, which is vast, and how he has delivered tangible victories for the state. Because Morrisey was the hardest working candidate I’ve ever worked with, he was able to at least somewhat keep pace with the negative ads leveled against him. The self-funding Miller campaign created 25 different television ads and over 16 million impressions alone! Much of it was negative weight against Morrisey. Miller’s Super PAC, which was funded by his dad, had another 2.3m impressions. The Morrisey campaign created 10 campaign ads and had just over 8m impressions, and the pro-Morrisey groups brought that number to around 16m impressions total, coming in shy of the combined Miller effort. This does not count the digital advertising, radio, and the countless mail pieces voters received in their mailboxes. Some in the media have suggested the spending was not worth it. These reporters lack the intellectual curiosity to actually get under the hood and understand a modern campaign. Morrisey won due to a few key reasons 1) He works harder than anyone 2) He has a record which people believe & like 3) They know he fights for their interests 4) We were able to more effectively use our paid and earned media to communicate our narrative than the other guys. This was a great victory and Patrick is going to be a national leader when he is elected Governor in November. #WVGOV