evidence: Former Representative Will Hurd is trying to make the Republican Party more competitive—and more moderate. Can he succeed? Will Hurd is the kind of politician who loves to find the middle ground. He spent six years as a Republican congressman from one of the most competitive districts in the country, a sprawling expanse that traces the southwest border of Texas along the Rio Grande. He’s got the jocular manner of a student-body president—which he was, at Texas A&M—and styles himself as a wonkish policy guy. "You said the magic word," he told me cheerfully when I called him up recently. "I love complicated. I love nuance." [...] Hurd: I was scared—not just for my colleagues, but for all the staff who were locked down in that building. There’s going to be long-term repercussions. All of that happened because lies had been perpetuated for a long time. We need to step back and say, "Why did that happen? And how can you prevent something like that from happening in the future?"These are all hard questions, and I wish I had the answers to them.