John McCain Purging Arizona GOP Of Tea Party

Sen. John McCain is no fan of the tea party – and he’s now doing his best to purge the Arizona Republican Party of its influence.

According to Politico , McCain is preparing for his 2016 reelection bid by dismantling Arizona’s tea party apparatus. That includes a massive effort to remove or undermine the many local officials who have influence across state politics and could cause trouble for McCain in a primary.

Prior to Aug. 26, when the races for the party offices were held, the vast majority of the 3,925 precinct slots were filled by people McCain’s team considered opponents. Now, after an influx of candidates were recruited by the senator’s allies, around 40 percent of those offices — 1,531 to be exact — will be held by people McCain’s team regards as friendly.

The Arizona senator has long been considered a moderate, but that reputation has caused him trouble since the rise of the conservative tea party roiled Republican politics in 2010.

He hasn’t just gone after the tea party in his home state. McCain spars often with Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, memorably calling him a “wacko bird” last year after Cruz joined a filibuster by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.).

Cruz, who is considered a likely presidential candidate in 2016, has been equally disdainful of the kind of moderate Republican that McCain epitomizes, saying in October that “if we run another candidate in the mold of a Bob Dole, or a John McCain, or Mitt Romney, we will end up with the same result, which is millions of people will stay home on Election Day.”

After the GOP wave in November’s midterm election, McCain told Salon that he was pleased with the different kind of Republicans who had been elected.

“I think that you just saw a McCain-Graham injection into the United States Senate,” he said, referring to his close friend, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.). Pointing to the military backgrounds of newly-elected Joni Ernst (Iowa), Tom Cotton (Arkansas), and Dan Sullivan (Alaska), McCain said that he’s “campaigned for literally every one of them and I have not seen any indication that they [share Cruz’s] desire for confrontation.”

Meanwhile, in Arizona, McCain’s tea party purge has targeted names like Timothy Schwartz, responsible for a resolution censuring McCain as too liberal, and A.J. LeFaro, chairman of the Maricopa County Republicans. Schwartz was voted out of his position as Legislative District 30 Republican chair by newly-elected McCain-aligned committeemen, while LeFaro decided to forego running for reelection when he realized it was a lost cause due to the senator’s efforts.

“For John McCain to have been so vindictive in his actions…it’s just amazing,” Le Faro told Politico, adding that “it’s been all-out war” and compared the situation to “ethnic cleansing.”

According to sources close to John McCain, the senator’s tea party purge was largely a response to the Arizona Republican Party’s censure in January. The 78-year-old former presidential candidate “wanted to make sure it never happened again,” according to Mike Hellon, deputy campaign manager for McCain in 2010. That determination may help secure a sixth term in the Senate.

[photo credit: U.S. Embassy Moldova]

John McCain Purging Arizona GOP Of Tea Party