Brent Orrin Hatch in Salt Lake City in 2008.Douglas C. Pizac/AP Photo

It turns out that not even a famous last name, support from the conservative Federalist Society and its powerful leader, and a boatload of dark money can turn a Republican candidate into the next senator from Utah.

In early January, Brent Orrin Hatch threw his hat into a crowded GOP primary race that will decide who replaces Sen. Mitt Romney, who announced in September that he wouldn’t run again. Hatch was sure to use his middle name in all his campaign materials, lest voters fail to realize that he is the son of the late and revered Sen. Orrin Hatch. The elder Hatch, who was 83 years old when he retired, represented Utah in the Senate for 42 years. When he announced his retirement in 2018, he anointed Romney as his successor.

For 30 years, the younger Hatch has been a board member of the Federalist Society, the organization that President Donald Trump relied on to select federal judges during his administration. Its co-chair is Leonard Leo, a powerful figure who is close to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and who helped put Supreme Court Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett on the high court. He controls more than $1 billion in political advocacy money that he directs to far-right causes.

In Utah, Hatch had made a surprisingly strong showing right out of the gate. A January Deseret News/Hinkley Institute of Politics poll showed him running a close second to Rep. John Curtis, at 14 percent, in a race featuring 11 candidates. (One later dropped out.) Hatch also held a significant financial advantage over other candidates like Trent Staggs, the mayor of Riverton who staked out a far-right position aligned with the state’s hardcore MAGA voters. Hatch loaned his campaign nearly $1 million, a figure supplemented by an outside expenditure campaign funded with nearly $2 million in dark money, as well as large donations from his colleagues at the Federalist Society.

The two largest........

© Mother Jones