RantCrush Top 5: May 26, 2017

Greg Gianforte, the Republican candidate in Montana’s special congressional election, has won. Gianforte vaulted into the national spotlight on Wednesday night after bodyslamming Guardian journalist Ben Jacobs (although, as an aside, chokeslam would probably be the more accurate term). The election was called for Gianforte with approximately 50.3 percent of the vote. His main competition, Democrat Rob Quist, got 43.9 percent and Libertarian candidate Mark Wicks won 5.7 percent.

While many were surprised that Gianforte still won after assaulting a reporter who asked him a question, the fact that his victory was as narrow as it was is actually notable. Montana is a deep red state–President Trump won it by 20 points in the 2016 election. But the numbers are muddled by Gianforte’s recent actions–was the race as relatively close as it was because of the incident with Jacobs, or because people are unhappy with Trump and the Republicans in Congress?

POLITICO with quite the “welcome to Washington” note in Playbook for Gianforte pic.twitter.com/ozswp6mrFz

— Oliver Darcy (@oliverdarcy) May 26, 2017

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.