Tea Party alters strategy to turn populist anger into Senate seats

America's Tea Party movement is refining its electoral strategy to take a more pragmatic approach - a shift that could allow it to better translate populist anger into conservative Senate seats.

Since the Tea Party's rise in 2010 in the aftermath of the financial crisis and subsequent Wall Street bailout, it has tended to play a spoiler role for the Republican party in Congressional elections. Its staunchly conservative candidates have often displaced moderate Republicans in primary contests only to lose to Democrats in general elections.

But in a change, the Tea Party appears to be targeting races in 2014 in solidly "red" states, where Democrats have little prospect of victory under any circumstance. To the extent they are successful, it will bolster the coalition of fiscally-conservative lawmakers, led by Texas Senator Ted Cruz, that orchestrated the government shutdown and crisis over the debt ceiling earlier this year.

So far, nearly a year before next November's poll, Tea Party candidates have mounted challenges to seven sitting Republican senators in solidly red states, where victory against the incumbent will mean likely victory in the general election.

"I think the Tea Party has adopted a strategy where the primary is the whole game," says Jennifer Duffy, an analyst with the Cook Political Report. "Will all seven Republicans be in danger? Probably not. Could one or two win? Yes."

That approach marks a departure from the previous election cycle in which the Tea Party's passion and demands for ideological purity often trumped more clear-eyed calculations and candidates like Delaware's Christine O'Donnell proved a headache for the Republican party.

Ms O'Donnell, with Tea Party backing, beat a nine-term Congressman and former governor in the state's Republican primary in 2010. But she was trampled in the wider contest after her views proved too conservative for many voters. Ms O'Donnell's admitted flirtation with witchcraft, which forced her to run an ad declaring that she was not "a witch", also hurt.

Republican officials have blamed the emergence of such "unelectable" candidates - many with Tea Party backing - as one reason for their inability to capture the Senate.

No-name candidates usually face an uphill struggle trying to get enough money to run successful campaigns against sitting senators. But some of the Republican outsiders in this election are attracting financial support from activist groups like the Senate Conservatives Fund (SCF) and the Club for Growth, which have deep pockets.

In Kansas, Milton Wolf, a distant cousin of Barack Obama, the US president, is running against longtime senator Pat Roberts with the help of the SCF.

In a column that appeared this month on Breitbart.com, a conservative website, Dr Wolf, a radiologist, accused other Republicans of being "complicit" with Democrats who have hiked taxes and increased the US debt ceiling.

"This Senate race in Kansas exemplifies the larger choice that the Republican party faces. Is it enough to call yourself a Republican or even call yourself a conservative but still vote with and give aid and comfort to the Democrats whose singular mission is to expand government?" he wrote.

The other challenges against Republicans are in Kentucky, Texas, Wyoming, Tennessee, South Carolina, and Mississippi.

Of these, Mississippi senator Thad Cochran, who is 76, is seen as the most vulnerable, while John Cornyn of Texas, who has one of the most conservative record's in the Senate, is seen as relatively safe. Of the seven, Democrats could be competitive in one race - Kentucky - especially if the Tea Party's Matt Bevin proves successful in a primary fight against Mitch McConnell, the Senate's top Republican.

John Feehery, a Republican lobbyist and former senior aide in the House of Representatives who has been critical of Tea Party Republicans like Mr Cruz, sees other motivations behind the Tea Party challenges.

"The Tea Party activist groups have determined that the best way to raise money is by attacking other Republicans. It's really a counterproductive game if you want to mount an opposition to Obama and the Democrats," he says.

"I'm not sure if their game is to win all these primaries. It might be just to make Republicans more conservative as they legislate."

It would not be the first time that a Tea Party challenge - or even the threat of one - has forced lawmakers to shift to the right. In Utah, the defeat of Bob Bennett in the 2010 election opened the door to the election of Mike Lee, the senator who first endorsed the idea of a government shutdown this year and who is closely aligned with Mr Cruz. Two years later, Orrin Hatch, another Utah Republican, was able to stave off a primary challenger after adopting more conservative positions in the run-up to his race.

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