Thread: DeMint Vaults to Republican Kingmaker From Backbencher With

Me thinks he's ruffled some feathers on the RINOS

DeMint Vaults to Republican Kingmaker From Backbencher With Tea Party Win
By Lisa Lerer - Sep 16, 2010 5:00 AM CT

South Carolina Senator Jim DeMint

Jim DeMint, senator of South Carolina. Photographer: Tim Sloan/AFP/Getty Images

The phones wouldn’t stop ringing at the Capitol Hill office of South Carolina Senator Jim DeMint yesterday, the day after Tea Party-backed Christine O’Donnell, one of his protégés, had unexpectedly defeated popular Delaware U.S. Representative Mike Castle for the Republican Senate nomination. DeMint was besieged with requests for television appearances and interviews.

While Sarah Palin gets most of the attention for helping numerous unlikely candidates win Republican primaries, DeMint, 59, is an even bigger force.

The first-term senator and former marketing executive has vaulted from backbencher to conservative kingmaker. He’s a recruiter, fundraiser, and agenda-setter, racking up electoral victories for Tea Party underdogs in Senate races across the country, Bloomberg Businessweek reports in its Sept. 20 issue.

In the process, he’s rapidly building a power base in the Senate that will exert huge influence on the national agenda next year. He’s also angering some of his Republican colleagues, including Karl Rove, former President George W. Bush’s political strategist. I know that's a good thing.

They argue that O’Donnell and other “DeMint disciples,â€

The Tea Party could ruffle a LOT more feathers by exposing the corruption in the GOP. Expose where the money comes from and who is really stearing GOP policy. Who are the RINO GOP's biggest lobbying groups?

If progressives and rinos haven't woke up yet

They will soon