Another candidate, Chuck DeVore, an ultraconservative state assemblyman, seemed the obvious choice for the tea-party movement.

One came when Senator Obama was asked about charges that he had stolen phrases from a speech by Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick, using them in his own speeches without attribution.

Some older supporters from around the San Saba district even remember the Ranieri family's butchers shop, and how Claudio himself would deliver cuts of meat by bike as a teenager.