Tea Party Groups Attack Rove Machine

Photo Credit: Breitbart.comWith Karl Rove under heavy fire after his group, the Conservative Victory Project, took to the pages of the New York Timesto attack the Tea Party, donors are beginning to turn on the Project. Politico reports Friday morning that the Project will “essentially preform oppo research and grade potential candidates on a variety of factors that might affect their ability to win a general election contest.” Some donors are overjoyed at the opportunity, including media honcho Stan Hubbard and Fred Malek of the American Action Network.

But others don’t trust Rove and the American Crossroads team to judge talent for office, says Politico: “the plan has sparked nearly unanimous opposition from anti-establishment deep-pocketed conservatives who have begun formulating their own big-money counter plans.” Those opponents could include other major super PACs who have long believed that Rove’s establishment bona fides prevent him from making truly conservative decisions about candidates.

And even some of Rove’s heretofore allies may be wary of his crystal ball strategy after the disastrous 2012 election cycle, which heralded not just the loss of Senate seats in Tea Party-influenced races like Indiana, but establishment strongholds like Wisconsin. American Crossroads had a mere 5.7% rate of return – just 5.7% of the money they spent on the 2012 election was actually spent on winning candidates.

Steven Law, president of American Crossroads, understands that he is now facing an uphill battle with conservative, especially given his group’s less-than-stellar 2012 performance. Law promises an investigation into “all of our activities last year, as well as external factors that contributed to last year’s deeply disappointing results.”

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