Sessions Draws a Tea Party Opponent

U.S. Rep. Pete Sessions, R-Dallas, will face a primary challenge from Katrina Pierson, a well-known Tea Party activist from Garland. Pierson filed with the Federal Elections Commission on Thursday morning and announced her candidacy on her Facebook page and a new campaign website.

Sessions was first elected to Congress in 1996 — his third attempt at the job — and has been re-elected every two years since then. He is now chairman of the House Rules Committee, which helps determine what goes to the full House for consideration and debate. In 2008 and 2010, he headed the National Republican Congressional Committee, the political arm of the House GOP.

As recently as 2010, Pierson was among Sessions’ defenders, telling The Dallas Morning News that “Pete's voting record is stellar” in response to campaign attacks from his opponent in that year’s primary. But lately, her branch of the Republican Party has been turning against the longtime congressman for CD-32. Her Dallas Tea Party has recently taken to making posters of Sessions and others with their faces on milk cartons and slogans that accuse the lawmakers of being missing in action.