<p>Losing politicians’ efforts to discredit the electoral system pose a threat to American democracy. Previous work has identified a “loser effect” whereby voters’ views of democracy are diminished following their party’s general election loss. We leverage a national survey of state legislative primary candidates in 2022, providing the first study of how losing elections changes candidates’ views of the democratic process. We also extend the search for the loser effect to primary elections. We find that losing a primary election reduced candidates’ beliefs in the legitimacy of electoral institutions in their state. Losing candidates are more likely to perceive electoral fraud, and to believe that losers should challenge electoral results. These effects are conditioned by party; Democrats displayed larger effects on the belief that losing politicians should challenge election results, while negative effects for Republicans were larger on ratings of the democratic process and perceptions of electoral fraud prevalence.</p>