Anti-Establishment forces set off an earthquake two years ago that took out one of the most powerful members of Congress and changed the course of the country. On Tuesday, they hope to pull off an even bigger upset.

Notwithstanding the precedent set by the defeat of then-Majority Leader Eric Cantor in the Virginia Republican primary in 2014, the effort to take out sitting House Speaker Paul Ryan in Wisconsin faces long odds. He is well-funded and, by many respects, remains popular with his constituents in southeastern Wisconsin. He enjoys the support of an influential conservative talk radio host in the state.

“I don’t think you would see him say, ‘Uh-oh, I better up my endorsement of Trump from tepid to enthusiastic.'”

And, perhaps most important, Ryan has had the benefit of watching the Cantor debacle. Win or lose on Tuesday, challenger Paul Nehlen won’t be able to sneak up on him.

“All the polls have Paul Ryan well, well ahead,” said John McAdams, a political science professor at Marquette University.

The race has attracted a great deal of national attention, and several prominent conservative activists have weighed in on Nehlen’s behalf. Some Nehlen supporters hope the populist movement that fueled GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump’s rise will rub off on the businessman from Delevan. Trump and Ryan have a famously uncomfortable relationship, and Trump at times has lent encouragement to the anti-Ryan movement — though he did formally endorse the speaker Friday.

Even if Nehlen falls short, a close contest would send a strong message. Speakers rarely face significant opposition, especially within their own party. But McAdams said he doubts it would prompt a course correction from Ryan.

“I don’t think you would see him say, ‘Uh-oh, I better up my endorsement of Trump from tepid to enthusiastic,'” he said.

Businessman vs. Career Politician
Nehlen, a business consultant who has opened and closed factories all over the world, once counted himself a Ryan supporter. But he said his congressman betrayed him and the district by signing on to trade deals that encourage businesses to move jobs overseas and pushing immigration policies that depress wages and reduce employment opportunities for Americans at home.

“Ryan is the most open-borders, anti-worker member of Congress in either party,” Nehlen said in a recent interview. “Paul Ryan’s not a conservative. Paul Ryan’s barely a Republican.”

Nehlen links Ryan to Rep. Luis Gutierrez, an Illinois Democrat and one of the most notorious amnesty supporters in Congress. Nehlen calls them the “Wonder Twins.”

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Nehlen also regularly blasts Ryan over his support of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a proposed trade bloc that could include the United States and 11 other nations. And Ryan is wrong to support criminal justice reform that would reduce penalties for some drug-related and other offenses, Nehlen said.

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Beyond policy, Nehlen contrasts his private sector experience with Ryan’s long career in government. Nehlen recently obtained his fifth patent, for safety strainers designed to improve the performance of filtration units in manufacturing plants.

Ryan, in an interview last week with local radio host Charlie Sykes, expressed confidence in Tuesday’s primary and rejected his opponent’s “dark” outlook.

“This is not Wisconsin,” he said. “This is not Wisconsin conservative Republicans, and that kind of dark, grim indefensive thinking is going to be thoroughly rejected and repudiated on Tuesday, I believe.”

Nehlen has raised a substantial sum of money for a candidate challenging a House speaker. His $867,955 total — which includes $100,100 of his own money — falls well short of Ryan’s $14.9 million. But Nehlen’s campaign touts the fact that he raised more money in July than Ryan did.

National Exposure
With the money has come support from national figures who view Ryan as too accommodating. Former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin endorsed him in May amid Ryan’s equivocating over whether he would support Trump. (He eventually did.) In the last week, Nehlen has campaigned with conservative author Ann Coulter and former Colorado Rep. Tom Tancredo.

And last week, conservative icon Phyllis Schlafly endorsed Nehlen, telling Breitbart News, “We need someone who is going to be a spokesman for the Republican Party and its nominee. And if Ryan doesn’t fill that bill, we should get another one.” He has enjoyed national media exposure, including an appearance last week on “The Laura Ingraham Show.”

The Ryan-Nehlen race is playing out amid all sorts of political intrigue. None of the representatives from the conservative House Freedom Caucus endorsed Ryan, and several publicly expressed frustration that the speaker had not done enough to help Rep. Tim Huelskamp, a Kansas Republican who lost a primary to a challenger backed by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

Rep. Jim Jordan said Ryan could have helped Hueslkamp overcome criticism that he was not helping farmers in his district by getting him back on the Agriculture Committee, from which he was removed under former Speaker John Boehner as punishment for bucking leadership on key votes.

“Everybody knows if the speaker of the House says, ‘Tim Huelskamp is back on the Agriculture Committee,’ it makes a difference,” Jordan told Politico. “Everybody knows that would have had an impact.”

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Meanwhile, according to Politico, several former staffers and volunteers for Trump signed on to the Nehlen campaign — even as Trump this month tweeted, “Thanks to @pnehlen for your kind words, very much appreciated,” and told The Washington Post that he was “not quite there yet” on endorsing Ryan. But Trump did endorse Ryan on Friday, to the dismay of some of the real estate mogul’s supporters.

William Gheen, president of the Americans for Legal Immigration Political Action Committee, said he worries Trump hurt himself and Nehlen. He said it was “like a bomb going off in the Trump movement.”

‘David vs. Goliath’
ALIPAC, an anti-illegal immigration PAC, endorsed Nehlen and has had about 40 volunteers making phone calls on his behalf, according to William Gheen, the group’s president.

“We’ve tried to repeat everything we said and did that worked with Eric Cantor,” he said. “We played a role in that historic David-vs.-Goliath defeat of Cantor.”

Gheen does not mince words when it comes to Ryan’s record, and he sees no moral victory if Ryan barely hangs on.

“He’s a complete, lying fake,” he said. “We accept nothing short of the political destruction of Paul Ryan.”

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Polling congressional districts can be tricky. A Remington Group survey released last week suggested that Ryan led Nehlen 80 percent to 14 percent. In May, a poll sponsored by The Washington Free Beacon found Ryan leading 80 percent to 7 percent.

Those results contradict an internal poll released by the Nehlen campaign last month that suggested Ryan’s support had fallen below 50 percent. The survey showed 43 percent favoring Ryan and 32 percent backing Nehlen.

What’s more, a poll taken in June and July by Marquette University Law School found that Ryan is much more popular than Trump among Republicans in the district. Some 84 percent of Republicans and Republican-leaning voters viewed the speaker favorably, compared with 49 percent who viewed Trump favorably.

McAdams, the political science professor, said Wisconsin is not particularly fertile ground for Trump-style populism. Trump lost the state to Sen. Ted Cruz in the GOP presidential primary in April and underperformed his statewide total in Ryan’s district, taking 32 percent of the vote.

“Trump did badly in Wisconsin, particularly southeastern Wisconsin,” he said.