Dave Brat, the conservative who stunned Washington by beating House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) in the Republican primary earlier this month, doesn’t want to be stuck with the “tea party” label.
In an interview Wednesday with the Washington Examiner, Brat explained he feels his success in the primary proves he has a broader appeal.
“The national media is way too interested in trying to put people into little cubbyholes, and it looks like from the results of the vote I didn’t belong in a little cubbyhole,” Brat told he Examiner. “They’re trying to have their nice little jockeying, gamesmanship-type columns, ‘Dave the Tea Partier,’ but the evidence shows we surpassed our goals by a tremendous margin.”
Brat admitted he had strong tea party and grassroots support, but he said he ran on the “Republican creed.”
“I ran on Republican principles, and those principles are what matter,” he said.
