Sen. Rand Paul (R-Kentucky)

Greg Sowards may be a longshot to defeat Heather Wilson in the Republican primary in the US Senate race but he did pick up an endorsement from Tea Party favorite Sen. Rand Paul (R-Kentucky) on Wednesday (May 2).

From RealClearPolitics:

In a statement being released Wednesday afternoon, Paul said: “Greg supports dramatically shrinking government. Greg supports the 5-year balanced budget proposed by myself and Senators [Jim] DeMint and [Mike] Lee. He agrees that our future generations of Americans do not deserve to be enslaved by debt, and we need more champions like him in the U.S. Senate.”

Sowards has been aggressive in attacking Wilson as not being conservative enough.

On his website, the Las Cruces businessman calls the former congresswoman “Queen RINO” — the acronym that stands for “Republican In Name Only” — and goes after her voting record and calls her unelectable:

Sowards has a steep hill to climb by the time the June 5 primary rolls around. At the state’s Republican pre-primary in March, Wilson picked up 83 percent of the vote from GOP delegates. By picking up just 17 percent, Sowards fell beneath the 20 percent threshold has had to go out and collect additional signatures to ensure a spot on the ballot.

No candidate in either the state’s Republican or Democratic parties has ever won a primary after not reaching the 20 percent level at a pre-primary convention.

Wilson also has a mammoth lead in fundraising. In the last reporting period, Wilson had $1.45 million cash on hand compared to Sowards’ $705,861 — and much of that figure from Sowards was self-funded.