Thinking of Tulsi Gabbard, how aligned are the Hawaii Dems and Republicans with their national parties, anyway? The state parties were formed after the Pendleton Act ended the spoils system that bonded local elites into national parties in the first place, after all. I hear Puerto Ricans have local parties and engage with the national parties (for example, in presidential primaries) in highly idiosyncratic ways

I mean heck, I know some of the buzz around Sarah Palin before she was nominated as VP candidate for the ‘08 run was that Alaska politics were unique enough that she’d oriented a Republican administration to a “good government“ anti-corruption brand, (and had some connections to a state-specific third party)