Dave Brat, the Tea Party conservative who upended former House Majority Leader Eric Cantor in the Republican primary last year before winning a seat in the House in the fall, is still receiving the star treatment in Washington.
Cantor was expected to win re-election and keep his seat representing Virginia's 7th district, but Brat triumphed by 12 points, knocking Cantor off the midterm ballot. Brat then won the seat by almost 24 points in November over Democrat challenger Jack Trammell. Brat and Trammell were professors at Randolph-Macon College at the time.
Now, Brat continues to field messages from conservatives nationwide who have hopes of working in Congress,
reports The Hill.
The Hill reports that even Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., and real estate mogul Donald Trump, also a Republican, are working with Brat by helping to raise money for him as they campaign for president.
Brat told The Hill people always ask him how he knocked off Cantor without any name recognition.
"The playbook was just to run on fundamental positions that I think are true," Brat said. "It's in the DNA of my district, and they wanted someone who represents that.
"I'm flanked by all sides by American greatness, so it's not like I have some original message. I just pay attention to the fundamentals because I think they got it right."
Brat won last year's primary with a little more than $200,000 in campaign money, compared to the $5.4 million in Cantor's war chest,
The New York Times reported last year.
Brat has been a vocal critic of President Barack Obama since winning in November In December,
he called Obama's immigration reform "morally vacuous," and in January
he blasted some of the ideas Obama mentioned during the State of the Union.
Last month,
Brat and other House conservatives were critical of the media's treatment of Democrat Hillary Clinton, who is running for president, saying reporters should ask her tougher questions.