Establishment Republicans should heed Tuesday's primary loss by House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, radio talk show host Laura Ingraham said.
Political newcomer Dave Brat, an economics professor, won the Virginia primary with 55.5 percent of the vote to Cantor's 45.5 percent. Ingraham was one of a handful of conservative commentators who worked to bring attention to Brat's campaign.
"The establishment can either learn something from this, or they can consign themselves to the dustbin of political history," Ingraham told "Fox & Friends" on Wednesday.
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Cantor's loss is viewed as a rebuke to establishment Republicans and a win for the tea party. Ingraham said Brat's campaign hardly had any interaction or interest from national tea party groups.
"Not one major tea party organization came out and endorsed Brat, supported Brat in any meaningful way. We had a difficult time getting the tea party groups and Brat connected. They basically told him, 'You don't have a chance.' They wrote him off," Ingraham said.
Cantor tried to push immigration reform, which Brat opposed. Ingraham said the immigration reform debate was now "dead" and "over" as a result of Brat's victory.
"This is a seismic shift, or at least it should be, in GOP leadership. But, these guys are fanatics on this issue of immigration reform," she said.
Cantor lost, Ingraham said, because he "never could make the case to the people of Virginia as to why his 13 years in GOP politics delivered successes to the people of Virginia." She said voters didn't trust him because he didn't "come clean" on his views on immigration reform.
Former Florida Republican Governor Jeb Bush, a proponent of immigration reform and potential candidate for president in 2016, should also take note of public sentiment and Brat's win, Ingraham said.
"I'd be looking at this Jeb Bush issue right now, because Jeb Bush, I think, is a lot weaker today than he was 24 hours ago," she said.
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