Erick Erickson, the influential radio talk show host and editor of RedState.com, says he’s considering a primary challenge against Georgia Sen. Saxby Chambliss in 2014.
“For a week now, I’ve been getting calls to see if I would challenge Saxby Chambliss, once he really got into the whole raising taxes issue,” Erickson said on his radio show Tuesday night, suggesting he’d offer himself as a more conservative alternative to the Republican senator.
“Well, the pace quickened,” Erickson said, according to The Georgia Tipsheeet political blog. “I got a lot of people pledging a lot of money in the last couple of days if I did something like this. And I’ve been very adamant, I wasn’t going to do it, but after a few conversations today with a few heavy hitters in Washington, D.C. and some here in Georgia, I should at least consider it.”
The “whole raising taxes issue” Erickson is referencing are remarks made by Chambliss last week about the Grover Norquist pledge never to raise taxes that has become a major issue for Republicans on Capitol Hill as they work to avert the fiscal cliff crisis.
“I care more about my country than I do about a 20-year-old pledge,” Chambliss said.
The senator later took to Twitter to clarify that, “I’m not in favor of tax increases.”
“I’m in favor of significant tax reform 2 lower tax rates & generate additional revenue through job growth,” he said.
On Tuesday, Erickson said he’s “very flattered” and “will be in prayerful consideration of what to do.”
Referencing fellow Georgia talk show host and former 2012 Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain, Erickson joked: “Or maybe we should run Herman and maybe I can take his show next year?”
“My wife says she’s thinking about how to dispose of my body when she’s poured Quick Crete all over me if I decide to go through with it,” he said. “We’re talking about it folks.”