MICHAEL R. BLOOD | 05/27/10 11:25 AM
PAHRUMP, Nev. — Sharron Angle wants to wipe out Social Security, shutter the Education Department and return to the days almost a century ago when the federal income tax was unconstitutional.
A tea party conservative testing the limits of anti-government sentiment, she’s also the Republican on the rise in an unpredictable race to pick an opponent for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a top Democrat in Washington who’s in trouble at home.
What’s more, she is evidently the Republican whom Reid would like most to run against. Witness a costly television campaign financed by the majority leader’s backers to erode the support of the shaky Republican front-runner, Sue Lowden.
"I am the tea party," said Angle, a 60-year-old former Nevada lawmaker.
With early voting under way for the June 8 primary, Angle has nearly erased Lowden’s double-digit lead in recent polls, thanks in part to endorsements from the Tea Party Express and other conservative groups, including the anti-tax Club for Growth. Lowden, a former state senator, has stumbled after she suggested people might barter for health care using chickens and she faced financial questions about the use of a leased bus.
Club for Growth began airing an ad statewide Wednesday that calls Angle a fiscal conservative and common-sense fighter and argues that Lowden supports huge spending increases and that she backed Reid.
The three top Republicans in the 12-candidate field – Angle, Lowden, 58, and Danny Tarkanian, 48 – have in earlier surveys polled better than Reid, a four-term senator taking the heat for the state’s 13.7 percent unemployment rate, soaring home foreclosures and bankruptcy rates.
Angle is among hundreds of candidates nationwide testing how far voters want to go in 2010 to remake the federal government.
"A tsunami of conservatism is coming in waves across our country," she says. "My message is what the people want."
Sharron Angle, Nevada Senate Candidate: ‘I Am The Tea Party’