Republican 7th District congressional candidate Dave Brat waves as he arrives for a Rotary Club breakfast in Richmond, Va., Tuesday, June 17, 2014. Brat defeated House Majority Leader Eric Cantor in last week's Republican primary. (AP Photo/Steve Helber)

Dave Brat, the GOP nominee for Virginia’s 7th congressional district, is tired of being called a tea party candidate.

The economics professor, who beat out House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) for the nomination in an astonishing upset on a shoestring budget, told the Washington Examiner on Wednesday that his victory is proof he resonates with a wide cross-section of voters.

"The national media is way too interested in trying to put people into little cubbyholes, and it looks like from the results of the vote I didn't belong in a little cubbyhole," he said. "They're trying to have their nice little jockeying, gamesmanship-type columns, 'Dave the Tea Partier,' but the evidence shows we surpassed our goals by a tremendous margin."