Dems turn formation of new Tea Party super PAC into fundraising pitch

A day after a leading Tea Party group announced it would launch its own super PAC to funnel money to conservative candidates, Democrats strove to raise money off concerns that PAC could enable the GOP to take control of the Senate.

FreedomWorks, a non-profit that is considered one of the driving forces behind the Tea Party Movement, announced plans to set up a PAC Friday at the Florida Conservative Political Action Conference.

{mosads}Democrats sent out a memo to supporters the next day noted that Democrats are defending 23 Senate seats in 2012 and have only a four-seat majority. Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee Polling Director Crystal King said that Tea Party-supported candidates would end Medicare and privatize Medicaid, close the Environmental Protection Agency and gut President Obama’s health care reforms.

“Unlike many other organizations, this well-funded group will focus on the most extreme, right-wing candidates,” King wrote in the fundraising appeal. “Also, if the GOP gains a fundraising advantage, it can create runaway momentum before campaign season even starts.”

FreedomWorks’ new PAC has set a goal of raising and spending $20 million on the 2012 races, according to The New York Times, and plans to raise it in small-figure increments.

But their agenda for that PAC makes is closer to that of the Club for Growth, which frequently funds primary challengers to oust Republicans they don’t consider conservative enough, and less similar to typical Republican fundraising groups.

The group has already said it will work against Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), also a longtime target of the Club for Growth.

Enabled by a Supreme Court ruling in 2010, Super PACs can spend unlimited amounts of money – raised from people, unions and corporations – in support of political candidates, although they cannot coordinate directly with those candidates’ campaigns.