Mark Ovaska for The Wall Street Journal
Tea-party activist Rus Thompson plays key role in Paladino campaign.
He and Mr. Paladino, a multimillionaire real-estate developer, did have at least one thing in common: They had long been working to push aside elected officials whom they viewed as out of touch and responsible for high taxes and bad government.
Without Mr. Thompson's urging and his tea-party ties, it's unlikely that Mr. Paladino would have run for governor—let alone pulled off his upset win in the Republican primary against the more moderate, party-supported Rick Lazio.
There are many ways that the 54-year-old Mr. Thompson, who now serves as Mr. Paladino's driver, adviser and liaison to many tea-party groups, embodies the forces that propelled Mr. Paladino to victory.
He's an upstate conservative who was having a hard time finding home-improvement jobs. He's angry at Albany, viewing it as corrupt and too focused on the needs of New York City at the expense of the rest of the state. Much of his ire comes from his experience working for elderly homeowners, who he said could barely afford to maintain their homes and pay property taxes with their fixed incomes.
Mr. Thompson got his start in local politics, fighting battles such as an unsuccessful attempt to remove the tolls from the bridge to his hometown of Grand Island, which sits in the middle of the Niagara River just north of Buffalo. He led protests against politicians and formed early tea-party groups.
He sought out Mr. Paladino as an ally in those fights because he had heard the developer's radio ads criticizing the Buffalo school board and respected his charge to lift tolls on another major area highway.
Early this year, Mr. Thompson, who claims President John Adams as a relative, and fellow Buffalo-area activists were disillusioned with the candidates for governor. So he had a series of meetings with Mr. Paladino in the real-estate developer's office at his ornate Ellicott Square building. They bought roast beef-on-weck—a Buffalo specialty slightly less well-known than the city's chicken wings—and turkey from the small stand in the building's large indoor courtyard. Then they retreated up a large staircase, past the Erie County Democratic Party's headquarters, to Mr. Paladino's office and discussed what could be done.
"I said. 'I'd like you to run for governor,' " the mustachioed Mr. Thompson said, laughing. "He started laughing and he goes. 'What are you smoking?'"
But Mr. Thompson didn't give up. At the time, Mr. Paladino considered himself a tea-party member. He had been scheduled to speak at a rally for Mr. Thompson's group, Tea NY, the day after Mr. Paladino's son got into a fatal car accident—an incident that Mr. Paladino has said was another source of motivation for his run.
Mr. Thompson saw an opening when Mr. Paladino described being disappointed with Mr. Lazio.
Mr. Paladino said he thought at the time: "That's the best choice our parties can give us," Democratic Attorney General Andrew Cuomo and Mr. Lazio?
He and Mr. Thompson talked about what could be done to fix the state's problems. Eventually, Mr. Thompson asked Mr. Paladino if he could float his name as a potential candidate. Mr. Paladino agreed.
"I said, 'Let me do one thing. Let me go home and leak out to the media that you're thinking of running for governor,'" Mr. Thompson said. Mr. Paladino was soon deluged with calls from potential supporters. "He calls me up three hours later and goes, 'What the hell did you get me into?'"
Other activists were stunned.
"I never thought about asking" Mr. Paladino, said Leonard Roberto, an ally of Mr. Thompson. "I didn't feel like getting thrown off the balcony here. I wouldn't have done it. [Mr. Thompson] is a bull in a china shop."
Once Mr. Paladino decided to run, he hired Mr. Thompson to work on the campaign full time, allowing Mr. Thompson to leave behind his contracting business. At first, they started out driving around the state to visit tea-party groups in one of Mr. Paladino's BMW sport-utility vehicles. Mr. Thompson told the developer he needed to get an American car, a Chevrolet Suburban.
The radio rarely plays—though Mr. Paladino said he's a fan of Motown, the Rolling Stones and Bruce Springsteen—as Mr. Paladino works from the back seat or the group, which frequently includes the campaign manager and Mr. Paladino's pet bulldog, talks policy. Mr. Thompson often quotes from the Constitution or the Declaration of Independence.
"He's not a driver. I love being with him," Mr. Paladino said. "It's been a great education for me. I've learned a lot from him."