Tea party candidate dares McConnell to 'be a man' and run on his record

The tea party candidate who plans to face off against Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) in the Kentucky Republican Senate primary next spring challenged the senior senator to "be a man" and run on his record over the weekend.

Now This Is News caught up with businessman Matt Bevin at Saturday's Fancy Farm political picnic.

"Principle wins out over power every time," he explained. "This is a game that people are playing where it's power over principle. But in reality principle should trump power."

"This is a battle between re-electing someone just for the sake of sending him back to Washington, but I beg him to tell the people of Kentucky anything that he promises to do in the next six years that he's been somehow unable to get done in the last 30 years."

Bevin continued: "I challenge him to tell us one thing. Or one thing in the last 30 years that he's proud enough of that he can actually run on that as opposed to smearing me and Allison [Lundergan Grimes] and Ed [Whitfield] and anyone else in the race. It is beneath the dignity of the office he holds."

"And I am asking him to be a man, run on his record."

Speaking at the same event, Democratic challenger Allison Lundergan Grimes also slammed McConnell's record in Congress.

"The GOP has come to stand for gridlock, obstruction and partisanship," she told the crowd. “If doctors told Sen. McConnell he had a kidney stone, he’d refuse to pass it.”

Watch this video from Now This Is News, broadcast Aug. 4, 2013.