The GOP establishment experienced an upset last night when Tea Party underdog David Brat beat House Majority Leader Eric Cantor in Virginia’s 7th district primary race. After the political upset, Brat made an appearance on Fox News Channel’s Hannity.
“The American people are very interested in real ideas and moving beyond the sound bites,” Brat told Sean Hannity.
Brat attributed his success to the American people. According to Brat, Americans want to move beyond the controversy of right versus left and instead embrace universal American ideals.
“Our founding was built by people who were political philosophers, and we need to get back to that away from this kind of cheap political rhetoric of right and left,” Brat said. “I ran on free markets. I don’t know that those are right or left. I ran on rule of law [and] property rights. I ran on immigration. I don’t think those are right and left issues. I think those are just free market Constitutional issues,” Brat commented.
Hannity asked Brat what he will realistically do to solve the country’s problems if he wins the general election in November. Brat told Hannity that America needs to embrace free market solutions.
“I don’t think a lot of folks in D.C. understand what free markets are, so that’s the most important piece. Fannie and Freddie make two-thirds of all sum prime mortgages,” Brat said. “That is not a free market institution, right? That entity along with the FED print[ing] too much money back in ’03 and ’04 caused the housing collapse. So we need to take free markets seriously. That means we have to put an end to all these tax credits and tax deductions and loopholes.”
He also touched on the issue of amnesty and securing the border, which exists as a massive wedge issue between the GOP establishment and the tea party.
“First you got to get your own house in order before you can help others, and we’re out of control right now,” Brat said. “On fiscal discipline, our debt’s over $17 trillion, the unfunded liabilities are $127 trillion, and no leader on either side is mentioning the biggest economic problems we have in the country right now, and I base my campaign on those numbers.”
Brat also reinforced the notion of American exceptionalism — a notion which is very popular among tea party supporters.
“The history of nations is the history of central governments run amok, right,” Brat said. “And United States exceptionalism has meant to stay away from that tendency– that it’s easy to fall prey to trying to solve everything at the federal level, but most every federal program is insolvent right now, and everybody knows it.”
Radio show host and author, Mark Levin, also appeared on Hannity last night, giving a clear warning to the Republican establishment.
“The Republican Party leadership better wake up,” Levin said. “People want a new Republican Party with fresh faces, with vigorous leadership, and they’re not getting it and they want it, because the Republican Party is the only organization that can challenge Obama, and Schumer, and all the others and start to defeat them.”
According to Levin, Cantor’s defeat is telling of the rapidly changing political climate on the right.
“The people are yearning for a leader,” Levin said. “They do not like the status quo whether it’s defended by Republicans or Democrats. They do not like the head of the Chamber of Commerce– threatening people telling them, ‘we’re going to get amnesty or we’re not going to have a nominee.’ They don’t like Mitch McConnell getting up and saying, ‘we’re going to crush you’ or Boehner making his jokes. This isn’t a joke to the American people. This is their future, and we see the country slipping away– at least the kind of country that we want. And why is it so hard for these guys to articulate our principles? They talk about Reagan, but they’re Rockefeller Republicans.”