WASHINGTON - Mickey Tuck has a long list of grievances against his congressman.
The 54-year-old Floyd County electrician announced a Republican primary challenge to U.S. Rep. Tom Graves this week. He’s been an active conservative who “lets people know through social media” about Graves, but Tuck has never held elected office.
Graves, Tuck argued in a phone interview Thursday, strayed from conservatism by voting to for a six-month 2013 spending bill, the two-year Paul Ryan-Patty Murray 2013 budget deal, an extension for the Export-Import bank and the list goes on.
The Ranger Republican carries high conservative ratings from advocacy groups such as the Club for Growth and Heritage Action for America, but they aren’t as high as they once were, Tuck points out.
Tuck said he's been in contact with both groups, and they share his concerns, but "They’re not ready to step on the boat with me yet."
Tuck hopes to build a following by outlining his case against a congressman gone astray:
"When he was in the state house he was very conservative, even got slapped down a few times by the leadership at the Gold Dome. And when he first went to D.C. in the Ninth District, same thing. He went up there, showed his conservative roots, got his hand slapped a few times by [Speaker John] Boehner. Then I don't know what happened to him. He wandered away from his conservative roots and the 14th district is a very, very conservative district."
As Graves has risen to more prominence within the House GOP – gaining an appropriations subcommittee chairmanship in just his third full term – he has grown more allied with leadership, often as a liaison between party leaders and conservatives. He faced blowback for strongly backing Kevin McCarthy for majority leader last year, and he stood behind Boehner for speaker.
And yet, Graves was the House Republican leading the anti-Obamacare charge that led to the 2013 government shutdown, placing him firmly in the Ted Cruz camp.
Graves is now Georgia's top GOP appropriator and is taking more of a statewide view on the spending panel. Graves harbors statewide electoral ambitions, but he got a vivid lesson of the difficulties of such a bid last year when three of his House colleagues lost the Senate primary to a businessman who had never held office, in David Perdue.
A possible lesson: No matter how far to the right your voting record is, you can still be painted as part of the problem in Washington just by being here.
Retaining a House seat as an incumbent is a much easier task. Underfunded primary challengers need a lightning strike to win. As Peach Pundit's Charlie Harper described it, Tuck's bid is likely little more than an "excellent fundraising opportunity" for Graves.
Tuck, naturally, brought up the 2014 lightning strike – Dave Brat's unseating of Majority Leader Eric Cantor in Virginia.
“The guy pretty much had the same chance as I’ve got,” Tuck said.
Well, Cantor got caught napping and was a much bigger bulls-eye as an “establishment” leader.
Graves spokesman Garrett Hawkins had this to say by email when asked about Tuck:
"Tom Graves is in the fight right now, working to advance freedom. He's proud of his bold conservative record and will remain focused on serving 14th district Georgians."
Votes speak louder, and there’s recent evidence that Graves is minding his right flank.
Last month the House easily passed a bill to do away with the Medicare physician payment "doc fix," a bipartisan deal to make changes hailed by their backers as entitlement reform and blasted by some conservatives for increasing the deficit.
Graves was one of just 33 House Republicans to vote no.
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