Indiana GOP lines up behind Richard Lugar's primary challenger

Washington Post ^ | 02/21/2011 | Aaron Blake

[SeekAndFind]

Indiana State Treasurer, Richard Mourdock will launch his primary challenge to Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) on Tuesday with the support of a majority of both the state's 92 Republican county chairmen and its state party executive committee, he told the Fix in a recent interview.

"I feel bad that he's going to be humiliated by this list," Mourdock said.

Mourdock added that he believes Gov. Mitch Daniels (R) and Rep. Mike Pence (R), the party's two leading figures in the Hoosier State, are going to stay neutral in the primary -- though Daniels, who was Lugar's campaign manager three different times, has already committed to voting for the senator.

That such a large contingent of the party establishment should come out against or withhold support from an incumbent senator is highly unusual and reflects the difficult path ahead for Lugar in advance of the May 8, 2012, primary fight. It also suggests there is a clear path to victory for Mourdock.

Mourdock will officially launch his campaign with a six-city tour.

He said that running for Senate is not necessarily anything that he wanted to do or planned to do, but that he felt he needed to. "I'm the best-poised person in Indiana to do it right now," Mourdock said. "I kind of wish somebody else was, but I'm it."

In launching his campaign, Mourdock becomes the latest conservative primary candidate to run against a Republican incumbent. Last cycle, three incumbent senators lost renomination; two of them lost to tea party-backed candidates.

But Mourdock is clear on one thing: he is not running as a tea party candidate. While he welcomes the support of tea party groups and says he expects them to coalesce around his campaign, he recognizes the limitations of being defined as a tea party candidate.

[SatinDoll]

Dear fellow Freeper, if I was capable of discerning intent and reading minds, I would have married.

I’m without much in the way of subtlety.

[A. Morgan]

BINGO!!!!!

[Joe Boucher]

Lugar is but one of many RINO turds that need to go down in primaries

[Christian Engineer Mass]

If you can’t spot MSM intent after years on FR,,,, I can’t begin to understand that..

[Steve_Stifler]

My understanding is that Indiana has a sore loser law. If Lugar loses the primary, he can’t run in the general. Of course, he could still decide to endorse the Democrat.

[raybbr]

"The headline isn't going to be, 'Tea party candidate to take on Dick Lugar;' it's going to be, 'GOP grassroots dumps Lugar,'" Mourdock said. "There is tremendous unrest and tremendous dissatisfaction, and that's what got me in this race."

When they write that sentence, they do so hoping to simultaneously denigrate the tea party, and split them from this guy.

I think you are seeing things you want to see. Mourdock is clearly trying to run as conservative who just happens to get Tea Party support - and will welcome it.

I see the WaPo using actual quotes from Mourdock whereas your post is, well, all supposition based on what?

[jmaroneps37]

Just keep up all that tough talk about the TEA party Senator Lugar,(may I call you Dick?)

[Sarabaracuda]

"When they write that sentence, they do so hoping to simultaneously denigrate the tea party, and split them from this guy."

And Mourdock is already giving them the ammunition to do just that.