Matt Van Epps delivers his victory speech Nashville, Tenn.
Photographer: Brett Carlsen/Getty Images
A win is a win, sure. But a too-close-for-comfort Republican win in ruby-red Tennessee is the latest sign of a House GOP majority in peril.
Matt Van Epps (R), an Army combat veteran endorsed by President Donald Trump and buttressed by more than $3 million in spending by conservative groups, defeated liberal state Rep. Aftyn Behn (D) by about 9 percentage points in a special House election Tuesday — a big Republican under-performance from the president’s 22-point landslide in the same west-central Tennessee precincts just 13 months ago.
Van Epps was quick to praise Trump, while also echoing an increasingly ...