For Republican presidential hopefuls, the Conservative Political Action Conference has played a very specific role in the election cycle. It’s where candidates try to establish their grass-roots credibility and convince conservatives that those running are listening to what they want. The conference culminates in a closely-watched straw poll — an early indicator of the candidates who have momentum.
This year is an unusual one. After the midterms, the big story was that CPAC had become a place for has-beens and losing ideas. And with Donald Trump in the race, few candidates wanted to come and publicly challenge him in front of his base.
But after spending time inside the political establishment of both parties, Astead felt that this was still a must-see event. Any candidate with a hope of securing the nomination is still going to need to speak the language of the grass roots.
So, what do they want? We headed to CPAC to find out.