In an interview today, Texas lieutenant governor David Dewhurst contended that he had the support of many as tea partiers as his senate primary rival Ted Cruz.
“Our polling shows that with those Tea-Party members, that believe in all the tenants and all the principles of the Tea-Party, we split that vote right down the middle,” Dewhurst told Laura Ingraham. “Mr. Cruz got in this race some 8 or 9 months before I did, and racked up a lot of support from different people.”
“And certainly,” Dewhurst added, “between Mr. Cruz and myself, there’s a huge contrast between a lawyer that’s never done any of the things we’re talking about and somebody who’s very conservative – I’m the most fiscally-conservative lieutenant governor in the history of the state of Texas. I’m the most socially-conservative lieutenant governor in the history of the state. I’m a conservative businessman first.”
Dewhurst also criticized Cruz’s ties to D.C. groups. (The Club for Growth, for instance, spent $2.5 million in support of Cruz.)
“The Washington-insider groups that have been trying to hand pick a senator – I want Texans to pick a senator – but the Washington-insider groups funded about $6.5 million dollars in negative ads that didn’t say one true thing,” Dewhurst charged. “The only thing that they got right is that my name is David Dewhurst! And so I had to defend myself.”