Saying GOP control of the Senate is more important than any single candidate, a national tea party group threw its support Monday behind Sen. Pat Roberts of Kansas — the man the Tea Party Express had tried to unseat in this summer’s Republican primary.
The about-face underscored concerns within various factions of the conservative movement that the GOP’s efforts to win control of the Senate could hinge on Mr. Roberts’ re-election, and reopened simmering questions about whether the tea party insurgency has helped or hurt Republicans’ electoral chances over the last four years.
After turning back a challenge from Milton Wolf, a tea party-backed candidate with no electoral experience, Mr. Roberts is now trying to rebuild trust within the GOP even as he fends off an independent candidate, Greg Orman.
“I think at the end of the day that tough primary battle against a pretty much nondescript tea party candidate exposed his weakness, and so far there is no real indication that he is bringing all of those people back,” said Burdett A. Loomis, political science professor at Kansas University. “If they go back, they are going to go back in the most begrudging way.”
In order to try to push unity on Kansas Republicans, national establishment and tea party figures have parachuted into the state to do what they can to rescue Mr. Roberts’ campaign.
Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Sen. John McCain of Arizona, the party’s 2008 presidential candidate, have stumped with Mr. Roberts, as have tea party favorites Sarah Palin and Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas. Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, another hero of grass-roots conservatives, plans to campaign with Mr. Roberts later this month.
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GOP analysts, though, say the key to the race could be winning the support of Mr. Wolf, who has backed Gov. Sam Brownback’s re-election bid, but has not endorsed Mr. Roberts.
“The difficulty he has is Dr. Wolf has still not endorsed him — even though a good number of Wolf supporters see the wisdom of endorsing Roberts because power of the Senate could be at stake,” said Matt Hickam, a Kansas-based GOP consultant.
“If Wolf would endorse Roberts and he could put that race behind him then he could run to the middle in a typical fashion, and then a Jeb Bush, John McCain, maybe Chris Christie — those types of more moderate Republicans — might allow him to get a large base of support,” Mr. Hickam said.
In the primary race, Mr. Wolf cast Mr. Roberts as a creature of Washington by highlighting how his primary residence is in Virginia, and warned that the incumbent was less conservative than he made himself out to be.
Neither Mr. Wolf nor the Roberts campaign could be reached for comment.
The Wolf-Roberts battle this summer was the latest in a string of primary fights going back to 2010.
Some Republican analysts argue that tea party-backed candidates ended up losing Senate general elections that more mainstream candidates would have won in Delaware and Nevada in 2010, and in Indiana and Missouri in 2012.
Kevin Broughton, spokesperson for the Tea Party Patriots, said if Mr. Roberts loses, he expects establishment Republicans will blame the tea party movement again. But Mr. Broughton said it will ring hollow in part because they share the goal of winning back the Senate.
“For the most part the establishment got the candidate they wanted,” he said. “If Pat Roberts comes up short in Kansas, will the establishment reflectively blame conservative activists? Probably so, but that is weak sauce because it looks like they could have put up stronger candidates.”
Tea partyers are open about Mr. Roberts’ shortcomings, but said the lure of a GOP majority swamps those concerns.
“This election isn’t about one issue or one candidate. It’s about rejecting the failed vision of President Barack Obama and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid,” said Taylor Budowich, executive director of Tea Party Express, in endorsing Mr. Roberts. “The entire conservative movement is united in putting an end to Harry Reid’s reign; and for activists in Kansas, that means defending one of Reid’s biggest opponents, Senator Pat Roberts.”
• Seth McLaughlin can be reached at smclaughlin@washingtontimes.com.
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