Broun’s stance against GOP budget drives Senate race

The vote scheduled Thursday provides the latest measuring stick of how much other Senate-eyeing House members hew their voting records to that of the arch-conservative Broun, which will shape the race over the next year and a half.

Put forth by Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, the plan balances the budget within 10 years, repeals the Affordable Care Act and imposes major revisions on the Medicare and Medicaid health insurance programs.

It’s not enough for Broun, of Athens, who said allowing an increase in federal spending in future years is too much to bear. And he’s saying it to anyone who will listen, from interviews to an op-ed article in The New York Times.

Broun voted for the Ryan budget in 2011, even though it spent far more than this year’s version. Broun said he did so as a show of support for the new House’s first big attempt at a Medicare overhaul. He missed the vote last year because a meeting ran long but said he would have been a “no.” …

Running to the right is typical for GOP primaries, but Kennesaw State University political science professor Kerwin Swint said Broun’s positioning is the kind of thing that gives some Republicans chills.

“The fear is twofold: First the fear is that Paul Broun is going to get nominated, and second of all that whoever does get nominated, like (last year’s Republican presidential nominee) Mitt Romney, is going to be pulled so far to the right that it makes them vulnerable,” Swint said. “That may be truer in other places than in Georgia, but conceivably that could still happen in Georgia. It’s not outside the realm of possibility.”